AT HOME

Some people hire gardeners to care for their house plants.

They see them as decorations to suit their interior design.

And indeed the flowers and plants enhance my regard

For the residents and their superb taste in gardeners.

I don’t have anything like a green thumb, and sometimes

They die on me, those plants, just at the time

When I thought I had done everything right by them.

Yesterday I separated a plant (whose name I don’t know

But I know she’s female) from her children.  We relocated

The children outside to a place where the air conditioner drips

From the neighbors’ apartments into the ground.  I hope

They won’t be homesick.  The mother seems lonely

So I sit by her and talk, and I’ve given her a name – Shirley.

I hope it helps because I really want her to blossom again.