The Family Garden
Kate O’Donnell
Her mother used to say
you can plant any root you choose
but your leaves will always grow
the same. Prickly, irrational, sprouting
too fast for any weather, they snake
up this red brick and tug away mortar.
She works too hard for pomegranate seeds
but the squish entrances her, lulled
into the color, the texture, the pop.
Her mother’s words pop less
and less persistently in and out of her ear.
If this life is summer, she is fall,
winter, spring.
Where does this leave you, six seeds later,
in which realm do you lie? This immortal contract
signed by another, what were the terms?
The garden walks through you.
The wet grass clings to ankles as what is poison
and what is life-giving slowly becomes clear.
Cherry tomatoes squish between wisdom,
oleander, hemlock grasp for throats,
These roots dig deep, tangling fingers, veins,
a woven ancestral web of all she has
never said, will never say.
Eons removed yet you still feel
your mother’s gaze, never missed
but always mourned. These roots fill
your lungs, holding you open, breath
never released. This myth will not
change, its seeds sprawl across
the sea, the world, this skin. You can
never forget who scattered them.
You will never stop eating her words.