I.
The girl walks out to her garden
and kneels beside the path.
Braiding and preening the entry
her little hands cut and slashed.
Her ivy once grew wild and free upon that garden gate,
now tied down and platted up
it lacked the beauty once innate.
“Oh, well it’s pleasing.” she sighs and smiles, “at least to mother’s eyes.
Maybe now she’ll visit.
Maybe she’ll even come inside!”
Pushing the gate wide open, a chill runs up her spine.
Big, muddy boot marks upon the path
leave an ominous sign.
The little girl is relieved to discover
only the prints this time.
She ran to fetch her broom
and sweeps the dirt aside.
“Oh well,” she sighs and smiles,
her path tidy once again,
“No mark to hide,
no need to lie
and nothing I cannot mend.”
Closing tight the gate behind her,
a storm passes upon her brow.
Her beautiful flowers stomped upon
will never blossom now.
She says, “I do not understand
how kids can be so cruel.
Haven’t their parents taught them all
the same golden rules?”
She swallows hard and looks up
to see the clear blue sky,
She feels the warmth upon her cheeks
as she squints against its light.
“Oh well” she sighs again,
but heaving a bit inside,
“At least these weren’t perennials
and I haven’t lost any time.”
She cleaned up the plot and placed
the trampled plants to decay.
“I may be sad about it now,
but you’ll be fertilizer one day!”
She smiled and stood to wonder
upon that spot again
and imagines what to plant next
to win for her that friend.
“One more spot to care for!”
And this was her favorite indeed!
She was told that if she kept it safe,
then she would have endless seed.
She imagines this new garden,
growing wild, abundant and free,
but real life is really unkind sometimes
and her dream could never be.
She looks upon her rows of berries
pulled up straight from their roots.
Never would she get to taste
the sweetness of that fruit.
She can no longer rise above it
and falls upon her knees
buries her fingers into the earth
and screams into the breeze.
“ I thought that I could trust you!
I took your word for proof!
I let you in, let down my guard
And you left me without root!”
She cries in that place until
she could cry her tears no more.
While fruit and root are sacred,
she had no seed to restore.
“To weed!,” she raged upon that spot.
“I have nothing left of sweetness.
I will never trust again
because trusting is a weakness!”
Running away, she dared not
To look back upon those plots
and places of turned up soil.
No flower.
No fruit.
No seed.
So now, all that was left was toil.
05182017LMT
