The Garden

Charge, Oh poet, the red-veined flowers of suddenly remembered intimacies - the foliage of memory. Feel, Oh poet, the warm knife of thought swift stride and slit in the ready garden.
- N. West, The Dream Life of Bosno Snell

Here,

time
past

has
never
seen

wilt,
nor will time
becoming
stir

with
brown the greening
leaves, or sever them from
the twig as the
snow

heaps
itself against the
burgeoning walls. In this last, lush place, set
between the sunrise and the dawn, the spring
in each blade is still
crisp.

Down

these
walks,

spread
about
with

that
smacking green,
flecked with small
tints

of
thrust stamena
whose stalks reach out for the
bee, our feet in
pairs

still
step till the harvest.
In this fleeting place, quiet and unseen,
my thought yet parts your hair as my dreams fall,
each with the tell-tale
leaves.

But,

as
they

drop,
yellow
stalks

the
tree-tops; bent
in the chill
haze,

the
sunrise begins
now its mellow decent,
breaking dreams with
day.

As
the first rays climb down
the branches, my yawning visions are spent.
Soon I rise, my thoughts perched on the sill;
blood in my eyes for
you.

- Nathan Sidoli, Mountain View, 1999