Sep 2
Stem-fed stem-feeding factories alive in the air
pull energy from the sun
pull water and minerals from the earth
to build themselves
and roots and flowers and fruit.
An exquisite geometry
grooms every petal and vein
fans up in three dimensions
while competing in four
with every neighbor
for airspace and sunlight.
They employ strategies
of shape and color and texture,
delicacy or density,
to finish cycles of a minute or a day or a year
as they thrive
to amaze and delight human eyes.
May 25
They’ve got all summer now,
so you’d think
there’s no reason for hurry.
But they’ve each signed up for a very particular window.
Get it up, get it open, let it down, thank you ma’am.
It can be a dirty business,
leave you tired, arrayed in droopy fading splendor.
Unless you claim the ground that holds you, the air you breathe.
Unless you’re lemon balm
or peppermint
then nothing messes with you,
you’re locked on for perpetuity.
The first hard frost is the real end, and that could be weeks.
But all the flowering plants prepare their final bursts.
Many are done already, a few will hang on until their petals freeze.
The chimley rose saved the best for last.
Since staked up, a mowing near fatality.
No more blooms to come, but we’re going out grand.
Will even a frost take down the lemony mint from its summer-long peak?
But the gatekeeper of the herb garden does not care about seasons.
A hunk of cloudy quartz shares some faces with other entities
but marks the gatepost without concern for any of us.
Nor rain nor sleet nor hail — never mind, it’s quite all right.
I’ll just stand here and watch y’all wilt and wither one more time.
