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IN THE BOTANIC GARDEN

by jared hayley

 

 

 

Shears rasp, remind how years

seem to deepen

the capacity for grief, for diversion, having,

in the meantime, planed both so thin.

Shears: synonyms, summers paired,

premonitions of Silver sliver and sever

You tell me things you should not tell your lovers.

Mine is the insistence of each shadow—

I have nothing but had.

What we work to untangle we mostly unravel.

Poor plants, pouring forth without release.

A locked chest in a room without windows

unearths in me. Inside something severe

seems determined to be said. But why say?

Why revive the body that was, so recently,

so reticent to live? Why does the singer feign

hard of hearing while we are screaming our adoration?

The telephoto lens pushes plants away.

The gong hangs with woe. When.

What was, was suppressed, is yet. Wend.

The voice we weary of will always return. Wren.

Yet is the thing we can no longer bear to hear.

And yet you have said

but how am I to remember

I had no choice, I felt, ever.

Jared K Hayley has published poems in various journals. They raise children, build guitars, and do odd jobs on Long Island.

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