Teesta Review: A
Journal of Poetry, Volume 4, Number 1. May 2021. ISSN: 2581-7094
Tillers of the Soil
--- Aggie Wolf
Dear Jen and Dad,
I dug in my garden today -
found some little potatoes
nestled there, in the earth.
Remember the time while harvested potatoes
we found a nest of baby mice?
They looked like beagle puppies...
Planted grosse lisse tomatoes -
your favourite, Dad.
A bit early, but put some in
like you showed me -
Dig a hole, fill with water,
a slurry of blood and bone;
firm down around the roots.
I pruned the lemon tree you gave me, Jen.
The last trim it had - we did together.
The day before you left us Jen,
I hacked back the bougainvillea.
Something to do as I wept for you,
slipping away from us
in your bed in the mountains.
Today, while gathering the prunings
I found the earring I lost.
The one you said you liked
that last day we spent on earth together.
They matched my scarf, you said
That I was always good with colour.
Thank you for finding the strength
to gift me this memory
While your beautiful life was ebbing from
you.
I sat beneath the umbrella
at the table, after gardening.
The rain came.
I saw your hands, Dad.
The way they looked at the close of the
day.
But they were my hands -
caked with dried earth.
Picking some baby broad beans
in the soft drizzle,
I ate them, still warm from the
mother-stem.
You’d have loved them, both of you.
The sweet, bright beans,
snuggled down inside their furry pod.
We loved the earth, we three
and in my simple, city plot
we communed together -
you sweetly haunting me,
this early spring afternoon
in the gentle, misty rain.