Gardeners
These men, they wrench flagstones
out of their comfortable niches,
leaving shallow recesses
for a thin soup of mud to fill,
they pour gravel
so that dust billows several inches high.
They lug boulders, they push wheelbarrows
and dig holes,
they rehome potted plants with care,
they wear faded bucket hats,
their shoes have fat rubbery snouts
smeared with clay,
and neon-bright green towels
arc across their napes,
dragging sweat-grayed corners.
The shrubs bear women’s names
like holly and andromeda,
the latter a princess chained to a rock
by workmen, who like these
carried out an assignment
but who, like these,
did their work with more gentleness
than required,
avoiding bruised stems, rattled roots. Watch them now
nudging fresh black earth
between delicate Andromeda’s toes,
whistling soothingly,
like attendants at a spa.
Jenna Le is the author of three poetry collections, Six Rivers (NYQ Books, 2011), A History of the Cetacean American Diaspora (Indolent Books, 2018), and Manatee Lagoon (Acre Books, 2022). She works as a physician and educator in New York City.
Header photo by Virrage Images, courtesy Shutterstock.
