not human,
not weather,
not god,
prevent the thriving?
The harvest of a bountiful crop withers on the vine,
gone gray with dehydration and simple lack of care
leaves torn to delicate lace by the ravenous.
How else should a garden planted during famine look?
In the end, it was the city
that forced me out through a bottleneck
where six lanes turn into two
and the two split mitotic.
One end snakes up towards the unexplored
while the other heads back over tensed shoulders
to what is formally referred to as home but feels more like
a cushion with regrets sewn into the lining.
featured image “Gorgonize” by Rachael Gay
Published as a part of Bolder Writers Warehouse‘s guest curation of Punch Drunk Press, November 2018.
Rachael Gay is a poet and artist living in Fargo, North Dakota. Her work has appeared in Anti-Heroin Chic, Quail Bell, Rag Queens, Déraciné Magazine, Gramma Poetry, FreezeRay Poetry, Rising Phoenix Review, and others. More of her work can be found at witchinghourpoetry.tumblr.com.
