Life Of Plants was Previously published in Waterways 31.5 (2010): 25-26
The life of plants is based on earth (for their roots grow downward). Their transition from integration to disintegration depends on the rise and fall of yin and yang. —Chang Tsai (1020-1078)
The lake within the Chinese garden flows
as if many springs
and rivers have found there
home if not yet rest
and I too
when you slipped (the doctor
used the very verb on the phone
to me) into
something penultimate.
I tried to steady myself,
my free hand on the rim of a pot
holding a bonsai older than the two of us
put together—
eddies of swirling currents: I wanted you
back; I wanted it
over; I wanted you
even in a coma in
my hands there
not here not even
in this perfect Chinese garden.
