kindness in the garden

this garden is generous. kindness in the calendula
which soothes my sore spirit and tired skin.
this garden embraces me with honeysuckle
kisses me with lavender
strengthens me with lifting, hoeing, carrying.
muscles sore from weeding, digging, bring me
a vitality, a sense of life and hope which had been
sapped by the mean streets and tired battle of the
working week. of getting and going and figuring it all out.
I struggle willingly with knotweed, my weary mind releasing
performance targets and bargains and who did what when where.
I abandon the complexities of body language and reading between the lines
for careful examination of red rust markings on the leaves of the roses and
throw aside the daily papers and lifestyle magazines, preferring instead
taking cuttings from a salvia or a pelargonium and laying barricades of salt and grit
around the succulent young sunflowers shoots.
against all advice from manicured neighbours, I plunge bare hands in grainy soil
and feel comforted
by comfrey

I shall stay here in the garden
where grasses ripple, where I slice a spade into thick clay solidity, determined.
where weight-lifting beetles triumph over every obstacle and teach me daily.
this teeming, busy world, never still, never without drama, yet always peaceful,
even in the night when a screeching fox and squirrel battle, ripping out chunks of tail
and berserk, shredding netting from the berries, still the garden is a sanctuary

out there in the dark I like it better than the worries of the world.
in a dressing gown and welly boots with a torch
be diligent; fill half a bucket with fat slugs and juicy snails
and transfer them to the compost or to some place of sacrificial planting.
this is how to chase away restless dreams. and maybe even fall asleep
on a lounger on the back porch, let early morning dew settle on your skin
and wake up and smell the wet leaves and the damp bark on the trees and shrubs
taste the leaf of a nasturtium, bold and peppery

I shan't come back in from the garden anymore
I won't go into the world again to be a fixer and a winner

I'll just stay here and potter and grow my dinner.