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Dave Bonta
the mountain hollow’s
yellow meadow
thrumming under another
morning fog
we curl around
our private griefs
before mourning becomes
a form of conformity
recall the headlonging
rush of young buds
the grand flourishes
the common sense we made
invasive weeds freed
from all native constraints
to wander the earth
planting our flags
in the old field I walk
between turnstiles
wind comes alone
with no good message
but one toke and I see
my dark nest
give the whole day
new fur
A weed, an insect and I
In a conference under the sun.
On the Lantana, flowers.
Pink, white and violet
They snuggle in bunches
Looking up at me like children
In awe of a giant.
Thorns prick my fingers
The stalk taut, lean like a whip
Refuses to oblige my hands
Trying to clear a path.
Then, glinting in the sun
This little Ladybird on a leaf.
Legs drawn up under the shell
She sits still, as if hoping
I wouldn’t see her.
The flower is like the sun, brightening up my day.
The weed is like the dark, not knowing where you are.
The flower is like the stars, sparkling bright
The weeds are like the moon, with only one good side.
The flower as beautiful as a diamond
The weeds as big as a crystal rock.
The flower petals are like a fragile child
The weed's are like your father's unshavened face.
The flower is like a numph with gleaming hair
It flows along with the wind here, there and everywhere.
The flower bows like the eighth wonder in ones who seek upon it.
The weed grows through the concrete path unable to touch the sky. It's pushed and shoved and somehow it survives.
My eyes feast upon the flower
But heart goes to the weed.
I don't want to repeat
the same mistakes over again,
or the mistakes somebody else made just so
I can have the experience of them. See, fucked up again. Live and learn. And off the excessive fondness for one's own self knowledge, untested, but reigning supreme. That leads me more astray, every day. What we commonly know in the air, in our dreams, what chooses continually & continually to grow, the obvious under our noses, is this life. Yearning in blindness. The weed has a name, is quite proud of itself, builds a community with other weeds, birds hop through. The imported domestic is a labor of love, but a labor, such a labor. At home here, no single thought is my thought. It whispers
She drags her rusty kneeler as way opens
amid plants knee high, wetting her blue
trousers in dew, as clouds decide
to open or not, as the morning star
recedes and hides itself, with a sliver
of new moon, in day. Poppies
have not yet awakened, nor daisies.
She kneels and kneels again, eyeing
potato vines, chard, kale, spinach, beets
to see are they hiding pretenders beneath
their skirts: thistle, geranium, nipplewort,
even nascent blackberries, ash trees, an oak.
Most of all, she seeks out bindweed, a long
vine snaking from place to place, climbing,
smothering fruitful things. She knows
she's prejudiced, but her rationale is:
She knows the weeds will win. Sometimes, at night,
Hearing them grow in her dreams, she'll wake, grasp
Even in her two hands, a phantom thistle, or
Knotweed, errant blackberry, or teasel.
Now not able to turn and sleep, she'll rise, throw
On her robe, and step out into night;
Walking the way the slim moon shows her,
She throws aside her garden gate and listens.
There might be corn and tomatoes chatting,
Having about as much to say as farmed things.
Even a whisper among the kales and chard --
Whatever such things say. Beyond are beds
Ensnarled in dock, barnyardgrass, bindweed,
Everlasting morning glory vines.
Dire straits; but there's no sound there.
She knows they're biding their time,
From the time of the early radishes
To the time of the standing corn
Sleepy Henry Hackerman hoes.
There are laws in the village against weeds.
The law says a weed is wrong and shall be killed.
The weeds say life is a white and lovely thing
And the weeds come on and on in irrepressible regiments.
Sleepy Henry Hackerman hoes; and the village law uttering a ban on weeds is unchangeable law.