On a cracked city sidewalk, signs of life are everywhere
A poem of fragile hope.
Hello.
I noticed sort of nonchalantly that I haven’t been writing much poetry lately. Whether it’s because I’m channeling most of my prose into this newsletter or spending my energy sending out query letters for my first novel, I didn’t give it much more thought.
And then I went on a run (by myself!) and this poem flowed out of me, lines coming each time I paused to notice the blooming honeysuckle or the broken eggshell on my path. It’s funny that I didn’t realize how much of my poetry is written while I’m running, something I used to do a lot more often before Noah came along!
The idea for this poem first came from a conversation with a friend about the “wild” strawberries blooming in my yard and the plethora of baby maple trees scattered among the uncut grass, below the Mother maple tree I love.
It’s a wrestling within of immense gratitude and sadness. Sadness for our apparent disconnection from nature and gratitude for the stubborn belief that we are nature.
The poems I share here are lightly edited, personal, and raw. I hope to share new and older poems more often in this space.
On a cracked city sidewalk, signs of life are everywhere
My friend tells me, the wild strawberries blooming in my yard are false- second cousins to the real ones blanketing open meadows in places far away But there is nothing pretend about their ripe, red berries Or the way they scoot across my urban lawn finding roots among clover and dandelions A forest of baby maples populate the uncut patch of feral growth I call my “urban re-wilding project,” counting the number of weeds determined to seed, feeding the birds and squirrels and crawling things At night, in summer I imagine a symphony awakened by moonlight I listen for the familiar sounds of crickets and cicadas, the hoot owl and whip-poor-will of my youth Maybe I hope to come alive with them, to remember the carefree evenings of chasing fireflies and counting stars, one by one head bent below the light of a pin-pricked sky On a run next to a busy street, I pause The piercing blue of a broken eggshell against black asphalt, wet with rain speaks of promise and new life While cars whiz by, nature is undeterred by modern man’s folly Seeds litter the lanes, far outweighing the number of cigarette butts Tributaries form grooves in well-worn pavement, minature watersheds mirroring ancient paths and branching veins They say the thyroid gland is shaped like a butterfly I picture mine, broken winged inside my throat, struggling to voice something more than defeat It’s true we are in trouble, our bodies fragile eco-systems fighting to breathe while disappearing bees and evergreens make room for concrete and currency; hearts break with clogged arteries while riverbeds fill with waste And yet, even here, in the middle of city, I see now why it’s called an urban jungle For as much as we try, we cannot escape the vines of life entwined, wrapped around our limbs Our arteries rich with the oxygen of trees and the hydrogen of streams may the sweetness of honeysuckle invade my heart forever
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