and am crushed to see
I should have started the seeds
indoors two months ago.
Apparently growing seasons are specific.
Should I wait until next spring?
Is it really possible I could still be here next spring?
Photos on the front of the packets
make my mouth water.
Even the flowers look delicious.
I decide to try half now and
save half for the future
whatever the future turns out to be.
Farmer Girl
Once again the library saves the day.
Provides everything I could
ever hope to learn about how
to plant and tend a vegetable garden.
(Back in civilization
when I grow up
I think I might want
to be a librarian.)
No time to waste so I get right to work.
Use Grandpa’s plot for luck.
The garden is so neglected and overgrown
it’s hard to tell it was ever anything
but a vacant lot full of tumbleweeds.
I am undeterred.
The thought of fresh homegrown vegetables
wakes me each day like an impatient rooster.
By the end of the week
I am sunburned and so sore from all
the weeding and clearing and digging
and bending and hoeing but I’ve done it
and my seeds are in.
I write the names of each vegetable
on Popsicle sticks to mark the rows.
I haul water from the lake.
I even make a scarecrow out of an
upside-down rake, a flannel shirt
and a pair of overalls.
The birds don’t seem to care
but it scares George.
optimism
satisfaction
pride
Unfamiliar feelings take root
in the soil of my tired soul.
Seedlings
The radishes are sprouting!
I have created life.
I feel like God.
Twenty-Five Days Later
I sit in my garden
on an upside-down bucket
holding a warm, white radish.
I brush away the dirt
and marvel
at how perfectly
exquisite it is.
It smells like earth
and life
and prosperity.
It tastes like euphoria
and hope
and laughter.
the bite
the crunch
the tang
the sweet
I roll it on my tongue
until my stomach
gets jealous and demands
satisfaction.
It does not disappoint.
Watercolor Sky
Starts to drizzle.
There is no thunder or lightning.
It just rains. And rains and rains.
The scorched little town is thirsty.
The cool moisture is a welcome change.
Washes away the trauma of fire and devastation.
Nourishes the growing garden.
Like a blessing.
Deluge
After losing count of rainy days
I hear a sound I haven’t heard
in over two years.
Water running in the house.
I look in the bathroom
and the kitchen
half expecting to see
a tap left on
but find nothing.
I go down the stairs
to the basement
which is hardly more than
an unfinished storage space.
Water gushes up
from a drain in the floor.
I grab a bucket
but the thick, muddy water
bubbles in faster than I can bail.
More water pours down the walls
from under tiny basement windows.
It is as if the earth has
drunk its fill and
the rain has decided to come
live with me.
It moves in bag and baggage.
I have no choice but
to watch the water rise.
A Plague of Water
I monitor the basement
constantly.
The water rises well above
the bottom steps
before the rain outside
finally lets up.
I pull on my father’s slicker
and Jennifer’s rain boots.
Venture out, leaving George
at home safe and dry.
Streets are rivers.
Yards are cluttered with debris.
Hubcaps. Porch furniture.
Broken fence posts.
Everything is littered with
leaves, branches, mud.
Where my garden was there is now a pond.
Popsicle sticks float on the surface.
Ducks paddle around my scarecrow’s knees.
The sky is the color
of bruises.
Matches the hue
of my new mood.
Flash Flood
I pick my way to the trail.
Hike up the rise above
the bike path and
look down on the creek.
A stream once narrow
enough to jump across
is now a torrential river
dozens of feet wide
rushing with a ferocity
I’ve never seen.
Bridges and paths are
washed away.
Fences are pushed over
or gone.
Roads are wiped out
leaving jagged edges of asphalt
like broken teeth in
a gaping mouth.
A red barn door crashes past
spins around
jams against the bottom
of the train trestle
creating new obstacles for
the water to pummel and thrash.
A pair of tractor tires tumbles by
like toys in a bathtub.
I start to back up but
the deep muck wants to suck
the boots off my legs.
I tug my foot
lose my balance and slip
down the embankment
toward the rushing rapids.
I scream
but the roar of the water
drowns my voice.
And there’s no one
here to hear me.
Trapped
I grab
at tufts of grass
as I slide
down
the muddy bank
but
my hands
can’t
grip
and I fall
into
the
torrent.
I come up
sputtering
head
above water
shoulders out
but
my foot
lodged
between two rocks.
The current
slams me
like a battering ram
against
a concrete
retaining wall.
I’m trapped.
Even as the river
pins me again and again
I feel it
rising.
I have to
get out of here
or
I will
die.
Rope
tree branch
rope swing
big knot draped
over pipe on wall
reach
out of water
up
farther
fingers barely
graze
too high
one foot stuck
one free
brace against rock
pull hard
harder
foot won’t budge
wiggle toes
in boot
wiggle pull
wiggle
pull
pull
pull
foot starts
to slide
cry out
deep breath
pull
more until
foot
escapes boot
water slams body
against
wall
breathe
brace
feet on rocks
count three
push
up
reach
stretch
up
reach
rope unhooks!
swings
way out
across river
away
water slams body
watch
arc
breathe
wait
brace
push
reach
grab rope!
hold hard
tight
pull
push
climb
push
climb
pull
pull
push
up
out
up
out
to safety
Wrung Out
I drag
hands and knees
up
the muddy bank.
Collapse
in the
soggy grass.
Exhausted. Shivering.
Ghost water still slams me
slams me against the wall.
My muscles don’t know I’m safe.
I’m safe.
I don’t feel safe.
I can’t hear anything
over the rush
of the angry flood.
The din and vibration of the rabid river
expand into my chest and my throat.
Grief presses on the backs of my eyes
and blinds me.
I wail
hugging myself
rocking.
Of Course
of course
I am alone
so no one
hears me cry
comes to comfort
or help me
of course they don’t
they can’t
because
they aren’t
so of course
they don’t
there is no they
the river stole
my boots
my socks
my feet are gashed
and bloody
my hands
are raw
rope-burned
rock-sliced
but there is nothing
to do
of course
except haul myself
up from the ground
and
go home
Parable
Home in bed
embraced in my comforter
curled around sweet, steady George
I remember a parable
from a friend’s bar mitzvah.
A man who drowned in a flood arrives in heaven,
angry that God didn’t save him. God reminds
the man that he sent him rescuers in a canoe,
a rowboat, and a helicopter, but the man kept
telling the rescuers, “No, God will save me.”
He was too foolish to recognize God’s help.
It’s one thing to stay alive.
I’m managing that with or without God’s help.
But how much longer can I stay sane?
How much more can I bear alone?
Elliott’s words
float through my brain.
“I think if I were the Challenge Girl, it would be
even harder for me to be alone for all that time.”
The challenges of fires and floods
can be overcome with courage and wit,
but this feeling of loss and loneliness
might just prove too great to endure
even for this Challenge Girl.
After the Flood
The world is strange.
A floating propane tank
tumbles downriver
crashes into a boulder
and explodes.
Wild animals
wander through town
disoriented and displaced
from flooded habitats.
And rattlesnakes invade
the neighborhoods
in search of dry ground
after their culverts overflow.
After surviving so much
for so long
I swear
I will not die
from a stupid snakebite
or an encounter with
a mountain lion.
When we’re outside
I ring the cowbell
from Dad’s bike races.
Stay to the center
of streets.
Eyes peeled
for anything coiled
or crouched.
Ears tuned
for rattles or growls.
When the cold weather finally arrives
and sends the snakes into hibernation
I exhale for the first time in centuries.
Another Birthday
I do not celebrate.
Push aside all feelings
about turning fifteen.
Every day is just another
to withstand and overcome.
Every night is just a Pyrrhic
victory of survival.
Emma and Ashanti already
had their birthdays.
I didn’t remember.
If a birthday falls in the forest
but there’s no one there to celebrate
do we still get older?
October
First snowfall.
Ongoing hunt
for food and fuel.
Basement water’s gone
but leaves a nasty smell.
The creek
is swollen
but has receded some.
I wonder if it will
freeze completely
or flow
through the winter.
Acceptance
(n.) the act of believing; coming to terms with something; recognition
Sanctuary
I love the library.
My own personal book church.
Safety.
But I’m losing patience with fiction.
The challenges and triumphs of
fictional characters only make me
feel worse about myself.
Novels end nicely and neatly
with all obstacles overcome.
Loose ends tied up.
My own story just keeps unraveling
with a depressing predictability.
In fourth grade, Mrs. Hawkins taught us
three kinds of literary conflicts:
humans against humans
humans against nature
humans against themselves
I don’t need to read novels to understand
the challenges of human survival.
Don’t tell me about tragic heroes on epic quests.
I am Penelope
weaving the days away
waiting for Odysseus
to return.
Emily
I hated poetry in school but for some reason
I love browsing in the poetry section.
There is something about poetry
being nonfiction
but not factual.
The most intimate personal thoughts
—things people would never dream
of saying out loud in middle school—
right there on the page in black and white.
I choose books based on the titles
and whether the poets’ names
sound like people I might like.
e. e. cummings is a rebellious teenager
who refuses to follow any rules
and Billy Collins is an eleven-year-old kid
who lives next door.
I wonder if T. S. Eliot is a man or a woman.
One day
I’ll go to college with poetic friends
sit in coffee shops
write stories about
the olden days of the imminent threat
the trials and tribulations
I endured.
I want a poetic friend to keep me company
explore alongside me
help me forage for food and fuel.
I run my hands along the spines
looking for women’s names.
I find Emily Dickinson.
The book falls open.
“Hope” is the thing with feathers -
That perches in the soul -
And sings the tune without the words -
And never stops - at all -
Well, that’s true.
I have never stopped hoping
my parents will come back for me
or at the very least
someone will pass through town
and rescue me.
But there are many days
when the act of hoping
feels even more difficult
than the never-ending work of
gathering food and fuel.
If Emily Dickinson is right
and
hope is a bird perching in my soul
then my hope hovers
on the verge of flying away
at any moment.
Mary
With Emily in my backpack
I move farther down the aisle
to New and Selected Poems
by Mary Oliver.
The woman on the cover
gazes at something out of view
as if she doesn’t know
she is a poet and
she is being photographed
for the front of a book jacket.
She looks pensive.
I open to a random page.
The Summer Day
Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean—
the one who has flung herself out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down—
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.
Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.
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