IN THE GARDEN

There’s much to be said for manual labour, and high among its virtues is the role it plays as an antidote to writing, which is, by its very nature, sedentary.
Anyone who has a garden will be familiar with the physical chores that accompany the changing seasons and it’s my good fortune to still have the energy and enthusiasm to engage in most of them.
My wife, Jane, is the horticulturalist in our home and I function as her assistant, providing brute force when required.
Our garden is largely her creation, a credit to her vision and expertise and a wonderfully peaceful retreat.
Now and again it inspires a poem. 

LADDER

A steel ladder spears the old tree,
a centurion’s silver blade
driven up through green foliage.

No mercy cut this; husbandry
requires minor amputations.

We choose gnarled branches, lop and saw.

One holds the ladder while, above,
the other cuts and passes down
dead limbs,

like ancient manuscripts

with hieroglyphs of bird and bone. 



Click here for Van Morrison singing In The Garden