six-inch-long okras
fried with an egg for breakfast
cucumber, beans, & zucchini
longer by an inch at evening
acrid scents of rosemary,
oregano — lure for frittilaries
portulaca — so many colors
jessamine winding a pillar
bright mounds of marguerite,
snapdragon, roses, & pinks
outflung tobacco plant
short smokes, white & orange
rosemallow & daylily
buds blown fat as lollies
frothy cosmos overtowering
African daisy & moonflower
curving spires of monks pepper
cream tipped, ripest lavender
small trunks, green leaves
a baker’s dozen of young trees
Swordy Well
by John Clare
I’ve loved thee, Swordy Well, and love thee still:
Long was I with thee, tenting sheep and cow
In boyhood, ramping up each steep hill
To play at “roly poly” down — and now
A man I trifle o’er thee, cares to kill,
Haunting thy mossy steeps to botanise
And hunt the orchis tribes where nature’s skill
Doth like my thoughts run into fantasies —
Spider and bee all mimicking at will,
Displaying powers that fools the proudly wise,
Showing the wonders of great nature’s plan
In trifles insignificant and small,
Puzzling the power of that great trifle man,
Who finds no reason to be proud at all.
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