TheBanyanTree: seed savers

[Julie Anna Teague]

seed savers
(just popped out... this is maybe a work in progress)

fairies of a next season and a next,
ad infinitum,
plunder dry stalks, 
pillage dead flower heads,
disect unplucked fruit,
looking for leftovers and castaways. 

to count:
zinnia--three varieties, 
gourd and pepper, purple cone flower, 
morning glory, marigold, 
nasturtiums like wrinkled peas 
and impossibly tiny specs of would-be lettuce, 
no sunflower, oily-black or gray-striped, 
(stolen by other winged fairies  
in yellow, blue, red, brown), 
but pumpkins: regular jacks and reddish pie makers,
and pale, fat, fairy-tale ones 
like Cinderella's coach,
like "there he kept her very well".

seed savers pass over
seed savers pick and pluck and dry 
they bag and label 
they dream of their grandchildren's grandchildren,
of their pumpkin's pumpkin's pumpkin.


Julie
jateague at indiana.edu