In the Garden

to Richard
After “To Dorothy,” by Marvin Bell

You’re my practical potato. sprawling out
over the rocky earth. I might have sought
a bird of paradise, lofty head standing
high above the crowd. But you
will nourish me long after their stalks
have fallen, when the bright rose,
in his pomp, has lost his petals.
You have all the eyes I need,
enough to sprout a garden, under
the ground, in secret, where nobody
but me will know. I go out there
with my spade and hack away
the roots, leaving a portion of
the tuber. I couldn’t grow a weed,
except by accident. Without you,
I would starve.

~

Robbi Nester is the author of 4 books of poems, a chapbook, Balance (White Violet, 2012) and three collections–A Likely Story (Moon Tide, 2014), Other-Wise (Kelsay, 2017), and Narrow Bridge (Main Street Rag, 2019). They have also edited two anthologies, and am currently beginning another, The Plague Papers. To take part in it, visit a virtual museum of any kind online, choose an object, specimen, or work of art, and write a poem or short piece of prose. Send it to rknester@gmail.com by May 30th with a link to the object online.