EDEN REVISITED
Reckless morning glory tangled in tomatoes,
crocus commingled with carrot and wild onions
shooting up despite daffodils. All the labor,
the expert botanists, the hand-lettered placards
gone to waste: years we spent sorting seeds,
learning to tell chives from early cattails, coaxing
ladybugs into lettuce and slugs from strawberries.
Fifty different tulips, set to bud in orderly spectra,
undone by common buttercups. Stray fuchsia,
immoderate orchid. Our rakes stuck in gates of thorn,
we stand empty-handed and watch them arrive:
the new gardeners unfazed by so much chaos,
content with all that beauty out of bounds.
from Breaking the Map (Blue Begonia Press, 2009)
originally published in ZYZZYVA
