* For Grandpa *

He walks the fence line,
In his slow and aged gait,
And turns a rusty lock that opens
The wooden warped gate.
He stoops to pull a Dandelion
With a dull pocketknife,
Tending to his garden
As selflessly as he tends to his life.
His hands are hardened, work-worn and coarse
As he reaches for his hoe,
To plant his bulbs, benchmarks, and beliefs
That, like wildflowers, grow.
He removes a salt stained hat from his head,
Wipes the sweat from his brow,
Turns his sun kissed face to the sky,
And leans wearily upon the plow.
He talks and touches, and walks and listens.
And the seedlings that he plants flourish and thrive,
As the years and growing seasons pass,
He nurtures each tender sprout with pride.
The path he walks grows sometimes narrow,
Choked with brambles and weeds.
But the roots that he has set down are hardy,
And have been lovingly cultivated from seed.
And I would walk a mile,
To walk ten more in the shadow of this man,
Whose gentle spirit and ethic of life,
Are traced in his calloused hands.
His legacy hangs on,
Like a cedar trellis of Ivy and Creeper,
On the faces and in the hearts
Of the blossoms of this garden keeper.


* de - april 5 2001