Encouragement

By Julie Leibrich

Janet Secker who shares a love of sonnets, encouraged me to write this book, and asked me to write about my garden.

It prompted me to think about all the gardens I have known and how special secret gardens are.

SECRET GARDENS

 

Wild nasturtiums first, in window boxes,

winking at passers-by on cobblestones.

Clover between the bricks on crofts with foxes.

War-time ruins, born of young men’s bones.

 

Later, beside the railway track, a lane

lined by mysterious flowers I’ve not seen since.

I held my Nana’s hand to watch the train.

Still taste the steam, still smell the smack of quince.

 

One year I went without a secret garden.

Just a cactus in a rented room.

Needed to prune. Time for cuts to harden.

Then lilacs, lilies, called me out to bloom.

 

That year, I tended the garden of my soul.

There, I found the space that makes me whole.