Poetry

Making a garden

Twilight, after classes, by the campus pond
We happen to meet
'Bad day' written across our faces
"That guy I was pursuing - he's gay," you moaned.
"That scholarship I wanted - I didn't get it," I groaned.

Life had barely brushed us
Yet we felt like victims
Spoke like survivors

Candide was right, we decided
(We'd been reading Voltaire in the same class.)
We must make our own garden.
It was our resolution. A pact with ourselves.
Tearfully, we hugged and parted
Two writers - in love with words and big gestures.

Where are you now? I wonder, years later
As I stand in my garden.
How did life turn out for you?

I should be hacking brambles
Ripping out weeds
Reclaiming lost ground.

But instead I'm planting seeds.
I dig up rectangles of turf
Add crumbly compost to clay
Drop each seed in place
Mulch with bark, soak with water
And imagine nasturtiums, flickering sunset orange and red.

And I'm listening to the swifts
Their gleeful shrieks as they rollercoaster in the May twilight
Chasing, always chasing