Seeds

by Sandra Sidman Larson

I walk by a garden pool
where water lilies glide

slowly with the afternoon breeze,
showing off their creamy faces.

Once in a fit of rage I tore
alameda vines I’d grown

off my back yard fence.
Someone else lives there now,

and they may have trellised
new flowers on the fence. So beautiful,

what can’t be seen by others.
On certain afternoons

reveries grow green, and
the wind off the Pali arrives,

forcing me to lean against it.
I still want to open the gate

survey whatever flowers
are there now,

but leave others to prune
back what is best

pruned back.

Sandra Sidman Larson, a storyteller at heart, finds the narrative lyric fits her approach to writing poetry best.  She has had two chapbooks published by Puddding House Publications of Columbus, Ohio, Whistling Girls and Cackling Hens, and Over a Threshold of Roots. She is currently working on a full-length manuscript Cardinal Points. Along the way, many of her poems have appeared in journals, on line sites, and other venues.  She lived in Kaneohe, Hawaii in the early 1960s and now resides in Minnetonka, Minnesota and is an active member of the Loft Literary Center in Minneapolis.