[Trevor Conway]

NEW VERSION:

(Some minor changes plus a new stanza added)


Gardens left untrimmed conspire,
always brutal in their wanting
to be more fearsome, animal, cruel
to concrete and delicate eyes.

They become dense,
impenetrable even,
with stupid growth and grand neglect,
accepting invitations of wind.

There’s taming in them
when someone has a mind to work
muscle and blade, time and spirit.

I have sought, like others,
to render them geometrical,
and felt success in mucky fingers.

All that, though, is bound to be brief.
Permanence is green,
sprouting, unsatisfied.



ORIGINAL VERSION:

Gardens left untrimmed conspire,
always brutal in their wanting
to be more fearsome, animal, cruel
to concrete and delicate eyes.

They are rendered dense,
impenetrable, in fact,
by stupid growth and grand neglect,
accepting invitations of wind.

There’s taming in them,
when someone has a mind to work
muscle and blade, time and spirit.
All that, though, is bound to be brief.

Permanence is green,
sprouting, unsatisfied.