GARDENING SELF
Fertilize your mind…
Dig away self-worthlessness…
Nature your self-growth…
In the morning,
Under bright, not yet hot, Sun
I water the garden,
Greens of all shades,
A sprinkling of flowers, in pastel hues
Plants all, soaking up their daily drink
With thirsty smiles
Water, running endlessly
From the river through the hose
Flowing, contained, now free
Soothing, nourishing, sustaining
All the plants
And me.
(8/13/26)
Innocent life obedient to God
Poise without violence, greed or hate
Or any other sin of fallen man
These remnants from the Garden of Eden
An infinitude of cells covering the Earth
Making food from sunlight and water
Every day that the sun shines silently
Thankful beings open coloured smiles
Just being themselves forever fulfilled.
Talking to the plants and trees
Is like talking to God, to the air
Yet they do not understand nor care
But I receive responses from them
About longevity and strength
Patience and acceptance
Flexibility and abundance
Continuity and cyclic change
Constancy and calm
Solitude and stoicism
And the rewards of care and love.
Gardening is a religious experience
OF AND IN POETIC GARDENING
(Apropos Of A Tanka Flow)
First, plow free your mind,
Then sow liberating seeds;
Letting others reap:-
Cultivating mentally,
Fertilizes destiny:-
Gardening poets,
Continue to plow and sow
Inspiring word-seeds:
Germinating reaped wisdom
Fruited with navigation:-
Poetic farmers,
Laboring in works of love,
Keep nourishing us
With those cistern-juices flow
From your gardens’ word-fruits:-
Through this vast world,
In the onederful oneness
Of fruiting onement,
Praises to farming poets,
For flowing fruiting fullness:-
Dandelions have seeded the lawn,
butterflies come.
Hosts of weeds
have invaded the cabbage patch.
The earth is enriched.
Dog poop in the unkept grass
nourishes the plowing worms
and grubs.
Doing nothing,
I have achieved Zen.
IN THE GARDENING OF LIFE
We are as the sun,
Our survival is of God;
Though down, we shall rise:-
We’ve sown bad seeds before,
And have had to plow them up:-
God’s fruit
Will never spoil,
Its sweetness is endless;
Its love, eternal:-
In the garden of life,
Each sunset has a sunrise:
Just check out Eden:-
Though we have sown worse seeds,
We’ve survived what was reaped:-
Hey, after the crucifixion, Jesus was resurrected:-
A garden is an
effort to express life's temp-
-orary beauty
My mother had a way with green plants
They wanted to please her, and so they did.
She took cuttings and gave them to neighbors.
Millions of cuttings. Provided the town with cuttings.
We kids were gardening as soon as we could walk.
Out in the country, on grandpa’s land.
An enormous garden plowed by a tractor.
Our garden was the size of a small supermarket.
We planted our vegetables in rows
Slit the bottom of the seed packet and put it on a stake
Every second or third row was marked
So, I knew how to plant, weed, and hoe a garden
I learned how to grow my own food
After getting my own place, I realized I missed home-grown vegetables
I decided to plant my own garden.
I chose things I thought might be easy -carrots, radishes, and peas.
Corn takes too much room, and pumpkins are not early enough.
I had learned plenty from my parents; my garden was a hit.
I also had two rows of flowers.
Remembering much later....
My mother always planted two rows of flowers in her vegetable gardens.
Zinnias and Marigolds
The same two flowers I chose to plant.
Hate poisons the soil
containing the seeds of Hope
you planted today.
It was time for them to face the out of doors.
Five weeks ago, I planted them indoors as seeds.
Yesterday, I planted the little tender plants in the garden.
By nightfall, they were being beaten by the wind and
rain, and it seemed that their likelihood for survival was
dim. Today, I proped them up, providing a little stick to lean on until they get strong. I am certain that they will be strong and grow to produce some good produce for my family.
In a couple of months, our little garden will be filled with tomatoes, cucumbers, basel, and celantro.
042425PS
For the blessed fruits of the blessed tree of life’s being,
Persecution and crucifixion have their time in life’s seasons;
Their demise coming with seasons of resurrection and ascension:-
Seasoning of life from Genesis to Revelations, has its time;
Let us ever be mindful that we’re fruits of God’s balboa tree of life,
With a quartet of years to sow and cultivate our seeds of justice:-
Thus, it’s time to get plowing and uprooting unjust seeds
Sown in the God given riverside just soil of His trees;
Indeed, as faithful garden balboa trees of God given life,
May we be in the blooming of ripe fruits His coming justice:-
May our plow sheds be ever fully stocked with tools of courage
And faithful determination, cultivating us with God sent liberation:-
And while trials and tribulations may endure for grueling nights,
Let us be bearers of fruitful mornings;
Indeed, let us be as the fruiting sun in joyous dawning liberation,
And let bigotry be as a waning moon:-
In plowing God's love,
let us sow seeds of His peace;
raking away war:-
Let's cultivate souls
in blooming gardens of wisdom:
Eden remembered:-
The Master Gardener makes no mistake
About His pruning, nor of what He must break.
It's because He's The Creator of it all!
So He knows all that must fall.
Trusting, let your "Sap" of Spring-Joy flow,
Always and faithfully, even if you don't know
The ways or times of Harvest coming soon,
All the excellence and blessings in the time to prune.
I wish I had the energy to do my garden proud.
But my poor back is groaning It is groaning very loud.
I have some great intentions to spend an afternoon
digging in the garden. But they evaporate real soon.
In another life, not so very long ago
I could spend all day in the garden
I would dig and rake and hoe
I’d plant out all the seedlings and prune the roses rare
Water all the vegetables and treat them all with care
But now, I’m very sad to say, those days are left behind
The thing about getting old, it isn’t very kind
But not to worry, you know what, I’ll get some gardening guys
Then they’ll do all heavy work, and I’ll just supervise.
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