Ingrid Keriotis
Freeway Dirt
Out the back door
there on my knees
where a mockingbird sings
off-key on a telephone wire
bumble bees bobbing in sage
snails scaling my butterfly bush
I pull weeds.
There are no great rivers here
no mountains
no monoliths
no wild-oak meadows
nothing not asphalt-lined
just one-quarter acre
I tend like thorns in my side
a sanity that must be saved
kept alive for battle
with Bermuda grass.
With each trowel stroke
I burrow into reeking soil
waiting for rain.
