The Gardener

The Garden of Eden by Lucas Cranach (1536)

The Gardener
by Ken Weisner


You get down on your knees in the dark earth—alone
for hours in hot sun, yanking weed roots, staking trellises,
burning your shoulders, swatting gnats; you strain your muscled
Midwestern neck and back, callous your pianist's hands.

You cut roses back so they won't fruit, rip out and replace
spent annuals. You fill your garden dense with roots and vines.
And when a humble sprout climbs like a worm up out of death,
you are there to bless it, in your green patch, all spring and summer long,

Hose like a scepter, a reliquary vessel; you hum
through the dreamy wilderness—no one to judge, absolve,
or be absolved—purified by labor, confessed by its whisperings, connected to its innocence. So when you heft a woody, brushy tangle, or stumble

Inside grimy, spent by earth, I see all the sacraments in place—
and the redeemed world never smelled so sweet.