Mastodawn

praying for rain

Perhaps the seedlings were better off inside,
 Really. She's never sure what's best for them,
 All down the years trying peat pots, blocks,
 Yanking down flats from storage, penciling markers,
 Ingratiating herself with baked soils,
 Now trying perlite, vermiculite, moss,
 Getting out lamps and heaters, rotating flats,

  Fighting intruding snails, mice and rats
 Or even knotweed, and bindweed
 Running its tendrils up through brick.

  Right now, she wishes she hadn't hurried.
 All her helpless babies in cracked clay!
 If it doesn't rain tonight, she tells herself,
 Never again shall I call April May.

waiting for the rain to stop

While watching forests comb those wet bellies,
 All grey and louring, of the heartless clouds,
 I wondered how the heavy earth breathes
 Thus more than dampened, more than drowned
 In so much rain. The very snails could gasp,
 Nudging toward such daylight as they might,
 Grudged them by the endless drops, dropping.

  Fear for my crops, standing in chill pools
 Or bent, prostrated, shambled, lying left and
 Right, I feel, yet not enough to go and see.

  There are tree branches, if I go, ready to pull
 Hair, poke eyes, and shower me to my skin,
 Every direction, along each path and bed.
  
Running streamlets ease a darkening land
 All river-bound, discovering the slightest slope,
 Inland being anathema to them,
 No place like home, their wide and welcoming sea.
  
There all streams meet, mingle, and play.
 Ocean the lowest place, where rain may end in
  
Stillness some times, or leap about, yet bounded.
 There it may stop awhile, then one day mist forth
 Over the waves and shores, plains and mountains
 Putting forth life and death again, a cycle. 

-- shonin #poetry #acrostic #dyptich #seasons #weather #drought #climate #homesteading #gardening