Katherine’s Garden

Behind the house
A garden
Late Summer
Tall Cone flowers
Faded
To worn pink
Petals depleted
Falling inward
Like folded umbrellas
Waiting for rain

Below them
Shorter flowers
Short
Like Katherine and I
Little flowers
Unlike Katherine and I
Yellow black eyed
Just beginning to bloom
And Katherine and I
Our blooms long gone

And below
Those small bright
Yellow drops of light
A darker green
Shadowed green
And lower still
Where the earth itself
Sits
Worms
Fungus and molds
Things crawling
Among the fallen
Steams and dead leaves

As they feast
The table covered with
The remains of spring
Hyacinth, Lilac, Sweet Pea
The purple and blues
Turned moist brown
Then to slime
Muck
Microbes
Becoming
Fertile loam
To begin
Again