Rocky Garden (My First Poem in Decades)
Rocky Garden
First saw a 12 year old girl
Working on her large garden by herself
Six to eight hours a day
Moving heavy rocks to build up her garden
Mother shouts to her father to come, please help her
He works beside her for a few hours
That summer was a drought
Her garden burns in the heat
Next year, at age 13
She builds up her garden further
Having bags of topsoil and gravel delivered
Enlarging her already large garden
Separating her vegetables by a wall of stone
Proudly sharing her vegetables with her family
Father does not help her
This year at age 14
My, how she has grown!
She looks like her mother
Still working alone
She builds a chicken wire fence around her garden, complete with a door
To defend against the neighborhood deer and rabbits
She builds another garden by the side of the house
To provide her mother with herbs
And another, on the other side of the house
In partial shade, for shade-loving vegetables
Another girl next door builds a large garden
Following her example
And an art student sketches their gardens
Savoring the idea of smelling and eating
Their vegetables
Healing her broken heart
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