#planting
Aging arms
splotched with purple and red
signs of tangling
with jagged, dead branches
reach for a copy
of Ted Kooser’s
Flying at Night
Pages flip,
stopping here and there
to read about
Sunset, Carp,
and Spring Plowing.
Envy swells inside
with the realization
that he will never
write such fine poems
about memories
of childhood adventures
Like Kooser,
he was raised
living in the countryside
among tiger lilies
blooming in the meadows,
near newborn calves t
eetering toward their first steps,
and around freshly spread manure,
capturing the scent of fall air.
His fingers grimy
from early morning planting
place the volume
carefully beside
his empty coffee cup
content that he is blessed
to have discovered Kooser’s work
He rises to tackle
digging potholes
for double begonias
to decorate his yard
and to dream his dream
of pages unread
and pages unwritten
Nov 1, 2025
Nov 1, 2025 at 8:14 AM UTC
All this life sought
Was in my feet forward,
Backing into stumble on rocks
With no path, life is an S curve
It hurts to fall hard
Worse yet
Is to not know why
I walked at all
A cool spring morning
In the rain with my canine on lead
Rushes into the glade
Where a doe may rest unaware
Still at old age I know, nothing
Every morning in the dark
My eyes open, for what?
I have lost all meaning of why
Are the next rising suns
Teachers on the green that
Remain after the snow melts
A reason for standing up?
I lost track of my dog in the meadow
As I listen to a poet who says
That tomatoes do not bleed
Is my life a fruit I can eat
Through the spring branches
I see a home below, pale yellow
A white door and a pane of glass
Asking, will I come forward more
An unknown, will I care to find out
Where is the deer and my dog
The door seductively beckons,
Walk this way with strong shoulders
Every day is an opening
For planting new things
Or letting the past burn to ash
Stunned in body and bones my trips to the ground
The knees and hands ******
And worn, as the apple skin
Holds a hole from the worm
I am the fruit as much as the scar that shines, happening now
Apr 24, 2025
Apr 24, 2025 at 11:30 AM UTC
I create with Earth,
my pliant hands in her soil.
Seeds of life we sow <3
May 28, 2022
May 28, 2022 at 1:30 AM UTC
Feeling good is:
Greeting a stranger with a smile,
Chatting with your elderly neighbor's,
And treating them with care and compassion.
Soothing another's pain,
Feeding hungry stomachs,
Standing with the oppressed,
Rendering service to others for no return.
Exploring a new idea,
Enriching your knowledge,
Reflecting and pondering,
Planting the seeds of positive change.
Listening to the whispers of love,
Inspiring the next generation,
Being around intelligent people,
Enjoying the company of soft-hearted friends.
Restoring people's shattered dreams,
Be their candle and their lifeboat,
Listening to the cries of innocent souls,
And showing them the way to a new dawn.
Lifting the spirit of the broken-hearted,
Delivering them through a helping hand,
Dressing your soul in a garment of giving.
Lifting your voice to be the champion of the forgotten.
Counting your blessings,
Reciting your prayers,
Contemplating the universe,
Listening to nature’s songs with muted words.
Hussein Dekmak
Aug 8, 2021
Aug 8, 2021 at 1:05 PM UTC
Respectability boredom
The basis of your
very happy marriage.
Added to it my painful
everlasting suffering.
My heart-ache,
and heart-break.
It all came to it's
inevitable end.
Everyone as everything
comes to a holt the"end."
I rolled your rushed up early dice back!
Rolled before I could understand the magic you were the deceitfulness the mind **** and hunting game
You now rip back
what greedy ones have planned for you
From that drunken ***** wild bird of paradise door you left ajared.
This universal law applies
as a balancing skale!
It just never fails
It's all an ever
pendulum Oscillation.
~~~~~~~~
By: Karijinbba
Copy Rights apply.
10-2020.
Oct 16, 2020
Oct 16, 2020 at 2:06 AM UTC
Please,
when you’re planting yourself in someone’s heart, make sure that there is enough sun to begin with, before you start.
Sep 30, 2020
Sep 30, 2020 at 9:09 AM UTC
Conceiving anew, Gaia
Waiting for you, Messiah
I have ideas swirling in my mind that I give birth to life
Nurse these creations until they live in my life
Or lives of many these burdens no longer heavy
My babies saving me whenever I slip
My babies keeping me sane during trips
To the night of the dark soul to recover my shattered pieces
Take these fragments to the sea
To inner peace the blending of all my energies
So I can co-create life for my sake because both halves are mine to take
I am the seed and the nourishment
I can create anything without interference
Not one or the other but a combination which is better
The ying and yang both blended together
Inside of me and my soul, I speak
My speech no longer riddled with insecurities
Throat chakra open and my knowledge devoted
To seeing the world change
In Gaia's name
Jul 5, 2020
Jul 5, 2020 at 2:41 PM UTC
in the palm of her ruined hands
was a single seed
if she grew one flower
spring would be in her sights
but winter pulled her down
together they were miserable
she could not bring change about
and so spring never came around
Jun 30, 2020
Jun 30, 2020 at 8:28 PM UTC
Deep sobs.
Grief has struck.
The loss of you running down my cheeks.
Clutching my heart
Though it might fall out into my hands.
It bleeds dark red and sadness,
Barely beating.
Cracked in a million pieces.
It feels cold in my outstretched palms.
Little shoots are popping up.
Flowers sprouting from its softness.
You helped me sprinkle those seeds.
You helped me grow.
To blossom.
More colourful than I ever imagined.
Yellows, blues, & oranges.
Wild flowers every which way.
Petals floating to my feet.
I am more beautiful because of you.
Apr 12, 2020
Apr 12, 2020 at 1:00 AM UTC
Weathered turf
Fights against the steel
Clean sharp spikes
Penetrating hard packed soil
Struggling to fight off
Dandelions and noxious crabgrass
Growing in greensward despite
A lack of much-needed rain
Renewal begins as
Aeration creates holes
Spaced apart ready to accept
Seed flung across the lawn
By the cranking of a flywheel
Beneath the canvas sack of kernels
Destine to become blades
Of new grown Kentucky bluegrass
Re-seeding, renewal
Essential for lawns
As well as all living beings
Which regenerate
physically, mentally and spiritually
to fight off
Scars and growths
That disfigure and destroy
Oct 31, 2019
Oct 31, 2019 at 5:09 PM UTC
checkerboard flooring, red rose walls
the large caterpillar's snoring, lets count humpty-dumpty's falls
excessively strong tea, smiles that drive the crowds crazy
a snakeskin hat just for me, something in the tea made the world a little wavy
find me that hare, i want a scone
the white roses are still there, i want a jabberwocky of my own
please give me a design, i'll sew it up for you
NO THAT ONE'S MINE, i'll make tea for two
i want to save the world, then again it really doesn't matter
'cause you won't understand a word, i'm mad as a hatter
Apr 12, 2019
Apr 12, 2019 at 10:04 PM UTC
spring planting, spring harvesting, spring garlic
One of the great joys of having a job in agriculture
is to think days, weeks, even months ahead,
One of the great joys of having a job in poetry,
like a fireman, a patient planter of love,
you wait to be called,
then becoming by being,
part of an all consuming burning
come spring, take advantage of the cool, wet weather of spring
to put in multiple crops of peas and lettuce, also a great time
to get your perennial vegetables,
like asparagus and rhubarb, started
the planting cycle is not an either/or,
come harvest thy labored fruits,
nine crops to harvest come March,
kale, pick leaves as needed,
leeks, best left in the ground
and harvested as needed,
parsnips, purple sprouting broccoli,
rhubarb, spring cabbage, spring cauliflower,
and of course, my personal fav,
Spring Garlic
Garlic, like like love, is generally planted in the fall,
before the frost and harvested the following late summer.
But from March to May,
once the ground has truly thawed,
the young lover plants, spring garlic or green garlic,
can be harvested.
it’s a long bus ride to Western Canada
where the garlic spring has come,
ain’t complaining lots of time to write foolishness
and plant a few good bus poems in northern ontario
and even michigan,
the window slides, and the seeds scattered,
but at every bus poet stop,
those that need it,
planted many inches deep
April 2 naught how I wish I was nineteen again
Apr 12, 2019
Apr 12, 2019 at 4:02 PM UTC
The snow has melted!
We are busy planting seeds
In our garden of Life.
Apr 9, 2019
Apr 9, 2019 at 3:12 PM UTC
as spring awakens
so does my heart
it's been packed away for
the cold of winter
but now my heart is thawing
the soil is softening
and i need someone to plant
their flowers here
because my heart is ready
to be nurtured
to feel nourished
and to flourish into the
beautiful blossoms
that deserve to grow
in my vacant heart
Mar 27, 2019
Mar 27, 2019 at 2:45 PM UTC
I
The snow is blank as
My apathetic manner
A seed thrusts out; new
II
Intense agony
Spreading and twisting in a
Worthless, weeping heart
III
The product amazes
Me; it's absolutely a
Lucid, pure nothing
IV
New Year's - a silent
Lullaby; empty promise
For the hopeful/less
V
Nothing ever came
From nothing; good trees do not
Sprout rotten, ugly fruit
Dec 31, 2018
Dec 31, 2018 at 10:02 AM UTC
How am I supposed to water my garden
When you were the only flower I wished to plant?
Mar 26, 2018
Mar 26, 2018 at 11:32 PM UTC
I keep a garden of weeds,
They're so hard to pull out,
But the always seem to grow back.
Seldom I follow the guides,
That tell me what to plant.
The seeds I sow,
Always lose their row.
And everything fades away to black.
Aug 23, 2018
Aug 23, 2018 at 10:14 PM UTC
In the center of my heart
She planted a tree.
Happiness a branch I'd soon know.
The leaves sprouting in full with
no limitation to height.
The roots carry the depth of how far
her hands have gone.
Planting the seed I'll always feel.
Soaring into the sky without limit.
To how much is given, how much we take.
The fruit of a smile ripe at every moment.
A gap for us to sit between the branches.
The moment fear of falling has gone.
The higher we climb.
The higher we sit.
May 7, 2018
May 7, 2018 at 3:27 PM UTC
I stand in familiar soil,
dry with ambition
left untouched,
and promises
left in the sun,
but never planted.
It’s not that I’m happy,
I’m tired.
I’ve always been.
The skin of my hands
cracks
under the weight
of a wheelbarrow
used to move the words
that have shriveled,
gone stale.
But still,
I plant
and I dig,
and I work the land,
planting the seeds
of my future
and narratives
promising myself
that soon
the flowers
will bloom.
Oct 16, 2017
Oct 16, 2017 at 11:25 PM UTC
He planted her life for reason,
gently grounded her roots into the Earth,
poured life into her existence,
a reminder of his triumphant resurrection
sculpted her petals,
like His outstretched arms
bearing the cross for all sins,
tears of rainbows splashed
upon her face,
coloring the hole in her heart,
overflowing it with His unconditional love
warming her with His peace,
transforming her life for reason,
to mirror,
His beauty,
His life,
His passion,
His grace,
His promise,
His love,
His purpose,
His glory.
Feb 12, 2016
Feb 12, 2016 at 9:20 PM UTC
Spring
that lovely season of planting
and praying they'll grow
Jun 25, 2015
Jun 25, 2015 at 3:29 AM UTC
He asked me
my favorite flower
and I said I don’t have one
because I didn’t want him
to buy me flowers.
Not just him,
I don’t want anyone
to buy me flowers.
I want someone
to plant flowers
within me,
water them,
stay to watch
them grow
outside of me
and never die.
Yet, he’ll never get it.
That’s probably why
he bought me flowers
that I watched die
sitting on my desk.
And I didn’t even
press the petals.
Oct 11, 2014
Oct 11, 2014 at 9:35 PM UTC
There were some roses, once, a long time ago.
They grew out of nothing, out of a tiny seed that burst and ****** its contents out into the new and terrifying air, and even then they didn't exist but for the idea that one day they might.
There were some roses, once:
the product of a process that included water and light and the removal of weeds and the implementation sharp protection from predators: deer and birds and squirrels and the like.
There were some roses once:
great surges of crimson fruit that bloomed so fiercely in their rebellion against the surrounding thorns
dedicated to the protection of the home of the finely spun veined silk that blossomed almost overnight.
There were some roses once:
Never has such beauty been guarded so staunchly;
and with good reason, for the rose in its radiance has but one short season to stretch its arms and breathe its perfume to which all lovers beg and swoon.
There were some roses once:
They faded,
green
then red
then crimson
then purple and umber.
But in their slumber we see the bloom we once beheld on that summer day.
We fondled their petals, hastened their decay.
There were some roses once, a long time ago.
They had to die, as if on cue, as living things tend to do,
and oh, they dried so elegantly!
Plainly meant for royalty.
And even in their most brittle form, they're somehow warm
Somehow still new.
So you plant some more, you cut the weeds, you draw blood on their thorny guards,
knowing that it's not for you, but for the birds in their back porch churchyard.
And the moment the first rose peers around from inside the womb, well
there's your reward,
to forward the growth of something so fragile and sweet.
So ruthless if you aren't aware of its teeth.
Aug 21, 2014
Aug 21, 2014 at 4:17 AM UTC