"mulch" poems
It is worse for a tulip to live again and be renewed
than for the tulip to die and be dead.
“What happens when you die?”
I asked several romantic partners over the course of my adolescence.
“You’re dead,” they answered.
It is worse for the tulip to be born again,
dust to dust, dirt to dirt, true god from true god,
in a process that spiritual peers define as, reincarnation.
No tulip is an individual (that is clear), but a process.
A perfecting oneness.
I can’t admit or bend to any resounding belief that every tulip is the same.
That FernGully was a farce and Pocahontas, a phony.
That is just not going to fly.
Maybe it is the environmentalist inside me speaking,
or maybe it is God.
I refuse to believe the prodigies and professors of renewal and rejuvenation.
I can not discount individuation, even in tulips!
Tulips are victims of suburbia, they have been relegated to the lawn, to the mulch bed,
but inside of them there are remnants of humanity.
I couldn’t believe it, ever.
Not ever, even if you convinced me or bribed me or seduced me.
No chance.
Jan 26, 2015
Jan 26, 2015 at 12:27 PM UTC
If I was dead,
And my bones adrift
Like dropped oars
In the deep, turning earth;
Or drowned,
And my skull
A listening shell
On the dark ocean bed;
If I was dead,
And my heart
Soft mulch
For a red, red rose;
Or burned,
And my body
A fistful of grit, thrown
In the face of the wind;
If I was dead,
And my eyes,
Blind at the roots of flowers
Wept into nothing,
I swear your love
Would raise me
Out of my grave,
In my flesh and blood,
Like Lazarus;
Hungry for this,
And this, and this,
Your living kiss.
Jul 7, 2014
Jul 7, 2014 at 7:00 AM UTC
People only ever want to ask me about
the poetry -
those verses about
busted up noses in outer space;
about the pros working
way down passed
the corner of Broad and Main;
about fistfights and hard, hard drinking.
But I built a flowerbed this weekend...
Twenty two tastefully irregular stone blocks
in a crescent moon shape,
filled with the blackest of soils.
The sweat of toil.
The digging.
The planting.
Exotic grasses. Asian maybe?
Purple and yellow flowers.
Zinnias or some **** thing.
All covered in a thick blanket of brown mulch.
It's a fine thing to have dirt on your hands
instead of blood.
No one ever asks me about flowerbeds.
May 14, 2018
May 14, 2018 at 10:12 PM UTC
Just a quiet woman polished bright by nerves,
I once felt wild for dipping my hair in purple.
Noticing, my hairdresser asked if I had anyone special.
I dated a man with a good job
who liked museums.
We saw a drunk girl in a leather skirt-
heels hobbling down cobblestone,
her bird-arm linked through a friend’s.
He rolled his eyes:
_would you go out wearing skirts like that?_
On the dating app I’d written:
loves dogs, drinks champagne from paper cups.
It wasn’t a lie, but I am such a liar.
I told him yes,
because I needed his reaction,
his self-corrected mind,
though I’ve never worn one.
I say I’m fine with whatever,
or this is stupid,
but truthfully
I’m afraid I’m only a very nice lady,
soft in the hands of whoever will take me.
I carry anger like a weak religion-
a god I light candles for twice a year,
more symbol than practice.
I’ve heard of burying St. Joseph upside down
to sell a house. But there’s no charm,
no saint, for loosening the knots I keep tied.
I want to keep the bright mess of my dog heart,
mud-spattered, mulch-snuffling,
faithful to its own scent,
while crows, squirrels, and the occasional fox
paw through the dirt
for what they almost forgot.
Aug 15, 2025
Aug 15, 2025 at 8:33 PM UTC
I am Autumns baby
my bones align every Autumn season
I come alive, rising from the earthy soil
I'm Summers poison,
my blood all hazey sunsets and leaf mulch
It's just something about the way the dawn and dusk shaded leaves flutter delicately onto my bronze barked skin
and the way the forest breathes, shedding it's summer shroud of green, canopy now thin
anticipating the snarling undertow of winters frosty bite
how the branches twist their arms and fingers,
reaching up to the light,
sky as blue as my doe eyes
the sunsets are all for me, low and piercing,
using her fiery fingers to stroke my face
I dance naked with the birds, the trees and the sun, a blur of grace
I'm all variations of brown, with the occasional pop of green
my lungs house my earth and its flower children, in my rib cage built of twigs with a magic sheen
my hair cascades like a molten copper mess
I'm a reflection in a lake, beautiful crystal but a construct you cannot caress
luke warm, barren branches and burning peat
crows, shimmering sunsets and crunchy leaves under your feet
I am Autumns darling
KG
Jul 25, 2018
Jul 25, 2018 at 8:02 AM UTC
*eking out the ultimate gasp in my last breath of impulsion
i collapse without a touch of grace at race's end
how i made it i will never know
dazed and in bewilderment
i reminisce upon my journey
an aggregation of barricades assailed me
with iniquitous decadent delight
seeming to writhe in triumph at my possible demise
capitulating as it devoured and spewed me out the other side
i humbly reassembled fragments of my near annihilation
temporarily rehabilitated
i recommenced the toilsome climb
to the treasured peak atop the mount
when in would come the tempest with its furor
and render me asunder
mere exhaustion is not the word
for death experienced recurrently
ground to mulch and back again
screaming, pleading, surrendering
proved futile as i newly met the same demise
near incapacitation i miraculously emerged
and scraping pulled myself with broken heart and bones
scratching my way through the darkness
toppling at the pinnacle
to victory's end
with exhilaration it dawns on me
the long dark night is over
i passed the test to realize
it is not the finish line
but only the beginning
©2016janetaylor
May 1, 2016
May 1, 2016 at 5:22 PM UTC
We call it “peacock hill”
I love this misty humidity that hangs here
sunlight barely peeking through; lovely mossy ground and wet leaves
turning to mulch under our tramping feet, we hear the peacocks call
in their unique tone - musical, alluring and promising
of a rare treat to the eyes, I’m only six years old, walking by your side,
and I don’t realize that in my excitement to collect peacock feathers-
***i’m missing the peacocks for the feathers
and
I’m missing your company for the peacocks***
and somehow if I could turn back time, i’d like to make that right
pay more attention to you, than to silly feathers or birds, beautiful though they are
just soak in the moment, and be with you completely
so that years later, when we live so far away
i’d look back on this moment with a lot less regret
and be glad, that we father and daughter
had some great times together
-Vijayalakshmi Harish
Copyright © Vijayalakshmi Harish
Sep 21, 2012
Sep 21, 2012 at 2:57 AM UTC
I used to tend to sunflowers,
Nurtured and nurished their seeds,
Through soft songs and flourished hours,
Their beauty a mirror to my needs,
It feeds a hole in my life's fabric,
One I cared not for to stitch in time,
So the hole has become a scar and what's tragic,
Is my sunflowers died and buried into that hole of mine,
I have spent years regretting,
Pulling away pettles and crying over the fact they won't regrow,
But though I knew not at the time I wasnt letting,
My sunflowers growing new and so,
In time I came to remember,
Something I concede that I should already know,
That the rotten dreams of last December,
Are mulch from which new sunflowers will grow,
So what if the sunflowers of my past may never not return,
So what if my fabrics torn and gaping gap will never mend,
The new seeds that I soe are now my new concern,
I have new sunflowers now to tend.
May 10, 2016
May 10, 2016 at 1:19 PM UTC
Forlorn beauty-child
Living in my night
Crying in your dream.
Sounds of sorrow
Linger in the morning mist
Of subdued consciousness.
Troubled water falls
From awakened red eyes
That searched inside loneliness
Only to find more.
Now...
Behind my faceted face
Your countenance lingers...
I glance quickly within,
You disappear!
Your gaze lit my shadowed mind.
Your presence was there waiting
For me…
A Sonata…
A Fantasy
A Major key bright-shining
Singing sunbeams to lift me.
After the music...
Shards of shattered dreams
Scattered like felled icicles
lying in the sun, melting into mulch
They dawned bright green
Pipers on Scottish dew.
The mourning moon is
Catchlight in your eyes
Bright Bird...
Captivating sailors
Reaching down evoking vulnerable
Aspects held so long secret...
Nov 25, 2015
Nov 25, 2015 at 2:38 AM UTC
As a child, they could not keep me from wells
And old pumps with buckets and windlasses.
I loved the dark drop, the trapped sky, the smells
Of waterweed, fungus and dank moss.
One, in a brickyard, with a rotted board top.
I savoured the rich crash when a bucket
Plummeted down at the end of a rope.
So deep you saw no reflection in it.
A shallow one under a dry stone ditch
Fructified like any aquarium.
When you dragged out long roots from the soft mulch
A white face hovered over the bottom.
Others had echoes, gave back your own call
With a clean new music in it. And one
Was scaresome, for there, out of ferns and tall
Foxgloves, a rat slapped across my reflection.
Now, to pry into roots, to finger slime,
To stare, big-eyed Narcissus, into some spring
Is beneath all adult dignity. I rhyme
To see myself, to set the darkness echoing.
4.7k
You walk to the woods from the mountains too fast;
trip over your feet when blades of grass nip at your heels
and take up life amongst the low.
Flotsam swirls in your wake;
silt rises to meet you.
The sun sets in deference to your arrival.
You walk among a sea of azaleas and fire:
bloody-thorned crown:
smoke laying low over the ground protecting your footfalls,
come to convince me of my damnation,
spill mulch in my bed,
and track lake water through my rooms.
You walk with broken glass in your heels
and blood on your cheeks,
spilt milk smile and sickly sweet lips,
cradling a dead bird and a lead heart in your hands
with a gallows leash hanging off your neck, onto the ground.
You walk into the house of my elders,
the sacred burial ground,
the meeting place,
the palace,
and the bar.
You order a scotch on the rocks, a lapis circlet, a book full of secrets, dead man’s blood, and my heart.
You walk backwards
around the cherry blossom orchard and its overwrought signatures,
harrumphing at arrogant petals and snickering birds:
politic in reverse and rough lines in slow motion.
There is something you forgot: it wears white linen and
sits on a rose throne.
You loved it, once.
You walk to the mountains from the woods,
barefoot and starving,
caked in mud and licking the shine off your teeth.
Your knees are bleeding.
Your heart is bleeding
Jul 9, 2018
Jul 9, 2018 at 11:29 PM UTC
My eyes were hooked on to the West
Feasting on the riot of colors the sun had cast
I stood dazed at an experience blest
That any poet would treasure with zest
By chance I glanced at the river below
It moved like an overloaded carriage slow
With floating weeds and ***** *******
Reminding one of an ugly heap of trash
I saw partially submerged bottles bobbing on the surface
Gradually filling with ***** water perforce
And slowly sinking down to rest in peace
With their sunken brethren at the river base
Spill of oil glistened iridescent
On the face of the river florescent
Its water was far from clean
But had turned murky green
On the still surface was a layer of ****
Like rancid butter annoying anyone’s calm
Reeking smell of rotten fish and mulch
Entered my nostrils with an obnoxious stench
I closed my eyes and turned my head
And looked away from the river bed
I thought of man’s callous audacity
In assaulting Nature’s pristine vitality
I heard the river’s rising lament
And me it did acutely torment
Any sensitive soul would be left grieving
Seeing the river in such agony heaving
In the far horizon, the sky had grown into flames
I wondered if Nature was mad at man’s tall claims
Suddenly I saw with the eyes of a seer
That Dooms day is drawing near!
Oct 30, 2016
Oct 30, 2016 at 8:58 AM UTC
You smell like rain
kissing dry earth. Your
magnificent torso rises
over buttocks I want
to sculpt. Your skin is softer
than cocoa butter and I am
lost. In your eyes, I see
stories. In your taste, I forget.
The rhythm of your heartbeat
lulls me to safety. But
will you stay to steep
the tea? Or halve my pills?
Everywhere is mulch and moss.
And fog and despair. But I come
back to the smell of rain.
And wait
for the sun to shine.
Feb 28, 2016
Feb 28, 2016 at 6:04 AM UTC
I wheel it out, my green and black bicycle
The roads shiny and quiet, the grey skies overcast
I start slow, breathing in the clean morning air
The fragrance of wet leaves and mulch, moss and old trees
I hear the morning song of the birds
And see the blossoms heralding spring
I nod to the old woman walking her spaniel
And notice the beating of my own heart
The rucksack a comforting weight
My breath even and warm in the wintry air
My derriere sore from yesterday’s excesses
The road, glorious, wide, welcoming and endless
Crossing the road, I am struck by the symmetry
Of a lone tree, leafless, bare, proud, naked
And the beauty of an old, stone church
And the wheels of the cycle keep spinning
The roar of traffic on the motorway always a shock
As I adjust, I breathe in the manure
From green fields so vast, flanked by white
And pause to see the muddy, turbulent stream
As I rack up the miles
My heartbeat is a sledgehammer
My legs are on fire
And I feel alive
Mar 3, 2016
Mar 3, 2016 at 3:38 AM UTC
Most late summer days fade into night holding a tepid dreariness in their breath, beating away with the tedium of the sun from late July through early September.
Yet ephemeral as it may be, the life of early summer is purely sanguine in the face of its oncoming age, as willowy saplings sway in the blustering breezes of June, and sprouts of vivid animation appear all around.
This is when the soul heals, and out of the mulch rises new beginnings and the ripening fruit of various works.
In this early season of summer, many taciturn inhabitants of the flourishing earth made their home, and among them, Lily: a creature of reticence and intricacy.
She burgeoned in attitude and character as days crept forward, extending her limbs upwards in an eternal paean to the heavens― as such was her sinecure and quiet delight.
In this, she stood insular to her ubiquitous family, an outsider to the sisters who flitted about carelessly on the wind, satiny gowns of pink and yellow billowing as they twirled.
Always invited into the fray, Lily was evermore stalwart in her choice to keep out of their plainly sordid affairs.
Yet in her isolation, the night whispered to her many a berceuse.
The sleepy stars implored of Lily’s indolent nature as she gazed into their eyes, trailing across eternity into peaceful slumber.
The night sky held wonders and questions that filled her paltry existence but placed her in stasis with the decorated heavens of her dying season,
Left to wither away with the insidious heat and vibrant splendor of late summer evenings.
Aug 11, 2018
Aug 11, 2018 at 2:45 PM UTC
Soil, mulch and flora.
Odors of spring on bodies.
Peonies ripen.
May 22, 2013
May 22, 2013 at 6:21 PM UTC
someday i’ll be too busy to notice the vampires
the sun wakes me up and i know who i am
maybe the chaos will always be there but
i’ll find a way to break it down into mulch and grow
pears and herbs and gardenias from what’s left of me
it takes a while to accept that the shadows matter
and i can’t pretend to know the watermelon lollipop
without the tongue that exists only to melt it away
to turn it into nothing until all that’s left is a paper stick
it might feel like freedom now but it can’t forever
i’ll pull down the curtains and never snooze an alarm again
the worst thing i can think of is writing the same poem
each day for the rest of my life and everyone knowing it
but me
Mar 27, 2021
Mar 27, 2021 at 8:51 AM UTC
When the moonlight
lowers
i see in the night
a tearful ghostly light
don't know where it came from
can't even get a whiff
but i know
the petunia is meditating
unperturbed
can't really read her heart
can't tell how strong
she actually is
though the frost and dew
have barged in
the angle of the fallen fence
is expanding
but this i know
when the morning comes
she'll be awake
she'll be something different
i know
it must be the sunrise
that is able to mulch and sprout
the most captivating smile.
Jul 25, 2023
Jul 25, 2023 at 8:40 AM UTC
~~~
*dedicated to the three, who read this first
(S.B, J.A., & T.M.R.)
and know it all too well*
~~~
more than ever presumed,
more than ever thought realizable,
indescribable attainable,
a modernizing magic powder,
synthesizing my intemperate body
~
at last, all ego falls away,
now but corn husk mulch,
detritus, non-toxic nuclear waste,
for growing better visions,
fruits undiscovered
~
write for me,
my recordings, my blog,
not to differentiate,
to substantiate,
to integrate
your gasps imagined,
mine realized,
exhalations upon lips grazing,
the soil of our rainforest
wetted by
living smiling,
eye droplets,
forming a singular stream
~
write for you,
sharing too close,
are you my first or second skin,
for there are no spaces
~
satisfaction discovered that is insatiable,
this pleasured seeing,
this pleasured sharing,
this poetic reason,
to exist
Aug 13, 2015
Aug 13, 2015 at 6:23 PM UTC
Crisp clear light of a not-quite spring
picks out the round black bin
quietly digesting the stuff of yesterday
Discreetly concealing
the thrumming, busy business of decay
The next act is approaching
in which we find
that nothing is lost or wasted
and the audience sighs with relief
Hoping
that the mulch
of lost loves, discarded wishes
and broken beliefs
will prove as fertile
as the rich brown muck within
the round black bin.
Feb 28, 2011
Feb 28, 2011 at 10:44 AM UTC
Gnomes out back who fuss and moan,
The weeds are too high they continue to groan,
I feel for them I really do,
But they know I am busy with so much too.
Ungrateful resin folk who cop an attitude about a few colorful sprigs,
Despite the fact they live in such lavish digs.
So some spiky ends of greenery may tickle their noses,
While they continue to hold their impish poses.
In fact I am planning a surprise for their flower bed,
Rainbow rock pebbles and new mulch will soon be spread,
Plus multiple squirts of weed-be-gone,
Next week you'll see a whole new lawn.
As I shell out more loot to keep this bit of paradise lovely-
I keep my eyes wide open for signs of impending mutiny.
Oct 26, 2014
Oct 26, 2014 at 1:08 PM UTC
crawlways aching for the idiot. that's me. that's a little harsh. we're only even with the world, then I wake up and ask for applesauce, or applause, because I'm a great tesseract under a strong thumb. so, are you snatching the smoke from my wildfire, the iron from my soil? I meant from my soul? no, sarcasm is ok. now how to be unmade into mulch and microchips! it's a wonder what they think of me, the foxglove in khaki pants, fire to herself, moody animal - too hispanic for their sun. resigned to being the mouth kissed for good luck, the cave-eyed ******* of a piece of gold and a cup of mud. now, to give up the secret password -
Sep 28, 2015
Sep 28, 2015 at 10:03 AM UTC
I carry you in my heart;
in my head; in my bones.
I would have carried you to the earth's end,
but now, you are simply mulch.
Sep 24, 2024
Sep 24, 2024 at 1:27 PM UTC
Ramble shamble gamble preamble .
Wild child dialed beguiled .
Crawl small ; fall tall ; wall all ; mall brawl doll you all .
Black sack fact track Jack smack wack maniac pack . Back hack , knack
flack , lack kayak rack tack .
Phone roan tone zone bone hone ; drone known . Own moan loan .
Talk rock ; gawk hawk ; shock lock ; **** dock ; balk , stalk walk .
Bristling gristle glimmer glisten .
Quaint paint saint feint aint .
Expressed suppressed repressed biased .
Ecstatic emphatic fanatic .
Lecherous treacherous .
Obtuse abstruse .
Whirl curl ; hurl furl .
Test west quest ; jest guessed ; blessed best crest behest . Conquest ,
invest zest ; rest nest .
Cohort cavort . Gulch mulch .
Raven haven saven braven .
Jan 22, 2013
Jan 22, 2013 at 5:46 AM UTC
It's supposed to be
98 and cloudless today.
By the time I roll in,
and park my car,
Roman's walking up to me,
his gold tooth a
full yellow smile in the sun.
“Hey meyer,
I need you to
Pull the box truck around,
We’ve got some plants we’ve gotta load,
Then we’ve got a landscape job
About an hour from here.”
“Are we gonna be back here
Today?”
“Probably not
until
late.”
The box truck
Is a holdover from the old owners
Of Ken’s Nursery,
It’s still got
Ken’s Nursery in large comic sans
On it’s rust-streaked sides.
The wheel wells are rusted
brown as salt deposits
On the shores of sulfuric oceans,
and little ringlets of decay
rock as the truck bounces;
It’s old springs
Giving back after all these years.
Today we have:
Forty-two veriagated ferns.
Ten dragon lilies.
10 cannas,
But cannas have to have a male and female to flower,
So 20 cannas collectively,
And we’ve gotta mulch.
By the time we’ve loaded all the plants;
stuffed the mulch in with the Bobcat,
And thrown in our picks and shovels,
My shirt is soaked through.
98 degrees and cloudless.
Roman walks to his car
and takes off his shirt
To reveal a pink belly
full of folding skin
and matted black upwelling *****
Singing with sweat-diamonds
In the unperturbed vision of the sun.
My shirt is soaked already too.
But even as I loaded the truck,
I thought about Melissa.
When I get home,
She probably won’t be there.
When the female is separated from the male canna,
Nothing dies, the two live happily ever after.
But the canna does not flower,
And doesn’t remember enough
To miss it.
Just continues quietly with a black bulb
The color of a skink’s underbelly.
Nov 21, 2011
Nov 21, 2011 at 12:01 AM UTC