A woman quietly turns a stuffy lounge full of wealthy old men into a garden. Each spring she pulls up the carpet, plants vegetables, and tends them while the men doze, read their papers and talk business, which the poem calls a "cold gray war." She gives away her harvest to squirrels, children and crows, and the men, who grow thinner and crankier, won't even dirty their shoes or speak to her.
The speaker never states a feeling, but the tone is calm, patient and a little wry. The gardener doesn't argue or protest. She just keeps working, which is the poem's idea of revolution: slow, generous growth against stiff, closed-off power. When winter comes she follows the men to their private beach and starts again with her "tiny trowel." The ending feels quietly funny and a bit ominous, since the sand castles suggest how fragile the men's world might be. The mood is gentle, stubborn and hopeful.