GARDEN
hurry up
final brushstrokes
finish that portrait
write
that chapter
conclude your
epilogue
they say
shock and awe
sturm und drang
they are
going to
decapitate the State
it will be a quick campaign
over in hours
I am neither tactician
nor strategist
but I would beg to
disagree (always
overthink things
a curse that genetics
handed down to me)
but for you
I would give time
infinite time if
I had the power
and I feel
you might have
requested it
for what
in all you do
does the soul
not require?
when
our music is all
discordance, dissonant
chaos symphony
and me
in this chaos space
so at odds
with your careful
subtle
cultivations of tranquility
you
with your precise
place to stand, viewpoints
and perspectives
place outside
this poem
space of refuge
green sanctuary
everywhere
nothing but sweet
sanity – – lesson, message
example
for the world
but have you now
quietly captured
in my mind’s eye
(and apologies for
the trickery that
did allow
me to intrude)
watching you
at work
patient, careful, loving
every moment
knowing
the secrets of the soil
how to make things flourish
painstaking, just a half a degree shy of perfection (yet
on the right side)
a teacher too, but I observe
in awe
a lesson here, not
for me uniquely
but out there, right there
place of deserts and gardens
where
life could
not be more sacred
bodies of bombed schoolgirls
lined up in rows across
the sand
over four score (to give
it a Biblical number
a collateral quota)
faces covered (saving us
the trauma of
God’s maimed body,
disfigured image)
transparent truth
warning to
take care
with what you
make of God’s image
image you
carry into war
with prayers
for annihilation, banner
in blood-soaked hands
hurry
with your garden
last hope
we all have
poems 2 die for 