Jim Zielinski’s Barn #2, Pastel, by John Cummings
(This poem’s audio begins at 5:24)
Sachet
I see us now in my mind’s eye
Martha and me in the herb garden.
It’s March, the redbuds bloom.
We rake debris from moist earth,
add worm casts, cut the winter kill,
prepare seed beds for annuals.
She sings snatches of hymns,
tells me her dreams and secrets
and I tell her mine. Martha, my sister
in the East family, twenty-five,
a new Believer, and I at forty,
twenty years with the Shakers.
While she sorts seeds we saved
in the packets she wrote upon
with her steep-slanted hand
I prune and graft perennials.
I stand, slip off my bonnet
let the wind lift my hair, dry my sweat.
She looks up at me, her
hazel eyes, mercury one moment
river green the next, says, “Come, Sister!”
And off to the woods we run,
to forage boneset, black cohosh, lobelia
“Wild herbs are healing gifts from God,” I say.
Summer in the rows of hyssop,
carraway, rosemary, calendula—
the two of us and a thousand
honeybees, humming at work
in Mother’s Garden. A redbird
sings “pretty, pretty, pretty bird”
from the tulip poplar
Martha finds a wren’s nest
with four eggs, tucked
in an old boot in the necessary
We harvest a bounty–
comfrey, orris root
marigold and rose petals
raspberry leaves, lemon balm
peppermint and fennel.
Martha’s face and hands grow freckled—
she doesn’t care. We forage elder
flowers, wild ginger and ginseng,
lie on our backs under the beeches
and listen to a change in the wind.
In fall we dry our harvest in the rafters.
Brother Harvey digs sassafras root
and we make syrup to soothe catarrh
When the paddle boats arrive
the brothers hitch up the team
load the wagons and drive to the river
Martha makes a wreath of rose hips
places it on her black hair and says
“I’m proud of our work”
I say, “Pride go-eth before a fall!”
Before frost we spread golden
straw down along the roots
and put Mother’s Garden to bed
as lovingly as we would any child
Sitting in this alcove in winter sun,
Martha long departed us
for Cincinnati, she said,
I see us in my mind’s eye,
and am solaced by her memory.
_______________
Cedar Koons
Review by Nancy Christopherson
Another rich poem loaded with sensory details: flowers, roots, garden scenery, outdoors sensations of wind, sun, water, all the elements of the natural world. Cedar Koons’ poems are some of the wealthiest in succinct detail and close attention I’ve encountered, and this one in particular makes me think of Mary Oliver whose poems quietly astonish. Here, poet Koons adds the human relations dimension, and teeters on the sensual in several unexpected places, which is thrilling. I very much admire her poems in this issue and look forward to discovering more of her work, elsewhere, in the very near future.