Well, I made it! Thirty poems in thirty days! This is the third time that I’ve completed the challenge. I did not post all my poems here, but most of them are. I’ll be taking a break and catching up on my other work for the next few weeks.
This poem was poignant and appropriate to write at this time, when planting and preparing my garden for the season.
Bury The Roots
“Work the soil,” my dad said, stabbing
it with a shovel, “and then add compost.”
We stood together, our long shadows
crossing the hole, two-and-one-half
times the size of the root ball. The loamy
soil smelled of worms and fertilizer. I sniffed
a few clumps of dirt before breaking them
with my fingers and dropping them back
into the hole. We lugged the pear sapling
to the edge, wheeled it around, and pushed
it in, shoveling more dirt into the hole.
“Cover the roots,” he said, “or it will die.”
He gave me the hose and I watched the water
fill around the base of the tree, while he watched
me, his face backlit by the orange sun–––
our shadows tall, parallel silhouettes.
Years later, I would look into a rectangular
pit, smelling worms and freshly-dug soil.
There would be one shadow, no pear tree.
Kim King ©2015
KSquaredPoetry 