The Next Garden

The Next Garden
Kim Goldberg

Reading Sam Hamill’s Habitation
in my unkempt garden as the sun crests
the roof-line, I watch you descend into the scraggle
of forgotten stalks—brittle, spent, gone
to seed. Last night on Facebook, Sam said
he would like to be in love again,
would like to have a traveling companion to escape
the USA. There were several takers.
I pondered the narrative for the half-life
of beryllium-14 (which is 4.84 seconds). It seems
I don’t do love anymore, at least not
with human beings. Your vermillion blaze

bobs above the weedy grail of each desiccated
umbel, erasing my undone chores and botanical
remorse. I forget the day’s plans, the incomplete
tax return, the emerging parsley and strawberry leaves
that need the ground cleared of leftover corpses
who were so carefully loved and tended. Once.

Our pact, although forged without words,
is secure in our mismatched hearts (mine is larger
perhaps from too much wanting). And when you transcend
to the next garden, I am on
your wing.

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