Her Garden

Donald Hall

I let her garden go.

let it go, let it go

How can I watch the hummingbird

Hover to sip

With its beak's tip

The purple bee balm -- whirring as we heard

It years ago?

The weeds rise rank and thick

let it go, let it go

Where annuals grew and burdock grows.

Where standing she

At once could see

The peony, the lily, and the rose

Rise over brick

She'd laid in patterns. Moss

let it go, let it go

Turns the bricks green, softening them

By the gray rocks

Where hollyhocks

That lofted while she lived, stem by tall stem,

Dwindle in loss.