Asparagus

. . . and gardening, and the Sapphic stanza

Because we’ve lived in our house for forty years, my garden has suffered many changes of mind. And because roots can be very persistent, sometimes my older ideas re-emerge. This poem is the story of one of those reappearances, told in the classical meter known as the Sapphic stanza, one of my favorite ancient rhythms.

(Some notes on the Latin: vis: force, vir: man, hortus: garden)

Asparagus

God of Roman gardens, obscene Priapus,
is that you? now risen in green and purple
thick-stalked rigor, here in the bed prepared for
old-fashioned roses?

Years ago I lusted for kitchen gardens
here, and trenched and phosphated, setting rootstocks
deep—and then I grew in a new direction,
longing for flowers.

Ave, old survivor, both vis and vir, old
force, green fuse still driving among the blossoms,
heedless of my changes of heart and hortus,
phallic as ever.

Heartless, though, to Bobbitt you off for cooking!
One alone, poor godhead, will never serve us,
hungry as we are for the primavera.
Gardening's answer:

Stand there still, O vegetable love. Grow taller.
Soar and soften out to a ferny greenness
feathered open, branched to adorn these hoped-for
armfuls of roses.

(published in Umbrella; in the book Breath Control)