by Rebecca Luce-Kapler
The Great Dixter poppies are dry in my garden,
heads rattle, seeds sprinkle near
the Virginia Woolf hollyhock whose seeds
a friend slipped into her pocket at Monk House
then shared with me. A tradition I continue,
sliding Stratford’s ruby hollyhock pods
into an envelope. Perhaps I can’t be trusted
on garden tours, eyeing every flower in decline.
I’ve become a seed thief, searching for the spill
from dried husks held in my palm, energy
that shapes days, stretches lines of continuance.
The scent of earth rises from my hand, mingles
with the bloom of late perennials and the death
of July blossoms; every day I feel the scales tipping.
— from Juniper Volume 3, Issue 3