The grass is overgrown in the garden-

creeping up to six feet high,

the blades and I, eye to eye

all of us reaching for the sky.

It’s been awhile since I’ve been home.

No black-eyed-susan to check-in with;

Her season long over, and her visions too-

I hope she forgives me for what I missed.

Dead dogs in the dirt, six feet under

mounds of ground stacked all around

the decaying bodies, I can’t bare to look:

they’re not truly there anymore.

Damn my mind. I can’t grasp that.

I will never fully grasp what’s been lost

as the cycle and seasons keep on-

There’s a slither under my boot.

A small black snake, seeking a patch of sun

Coiled, now disturbed, in her own home.

Inspired by:

This poem was inspired by Emily Dickinson's "Hope is the Thing With Feathers" (c. 1861) along with "I Felt a Funeral in my Brain" (c. 1861)- particularly with how her work calls upon the garden and grapples with death. I feel that the unkempt garden is a great metaphor for growth- how messy it can look from the outside, but how ultimately rewarding it can be down the line.