In a Green Shade

Of all the things I fail to cultivate—my will, my days—my weedy, sandy yardunearths me most. Its acid soil hardfor temperate plants to bear; they curl and waitfor tropical death. Each day I wake and findnew wiltings: dry squash, exhausted thyme,and, hidden by a leaf, one final crime:a pupa-plundered pepper, reduced to seeds.Yet weeds explode on skinny, taunting stalks,or long stems that bend with lavish blooms,to prove that nature throbs to certain wordswhich I will never speak. When green things talk,I’m a child, ear pressed against his parents’ room,who hears some awful thing, but hears it blurred.