I wasn’t drawn organically to the garden.
Housewarming plants have been given to me
with sideward glances and strained expressions,
as if sacrificing something to the altar.
Yet, as I've aged and grown into my own home,
I've filled the yard with new ambition.
I held my breath all season, turning corners
in hopes of finding a bright white bloom
on my sweet gardenia bush.
But it's not bloomed a single flower.
"Why would it?" I thought.
I know nothing more about calling a blossom forth
than I know about raising children.
And there—as they say—is the rub.
I raised my fist, my voice, my lily white womb
and sank back into the couch staring restlessly at my hands,
grief rising in my throat, and looked out the window for an exit.
And out there
on my gardenia bush
was its first
white
blossom,
shining at me
like hope.
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