Married To My Garden

The Inspiron 1100 has made it into my Brooklyn ghetto garden.

I spent the morning cleaning dead stalks of corn and weeds that died upon the fertile land that I rent here in Bedford-Stuyvesant.

No, I didn’t plant pot back here, but I assure you, that if it were legal, bud would flourish here in the outback of the Big Apple.

This is summer number four here in the home of my lover who died. We are coming upon the anniversary date of his dramatic departure from the physical realm.

The day after he officially died, I came back here and planted a few things to try and ease the pain.

The tomatoes and green peppers flourished but I was too sick in the heart to care enough to pick them and eat them as that first crazy summer passed.

My landlord helped himself to my crop, without even asking. "You don’t mind if I take a few of these tomatoes and peppers to my mother do you?"

"No, help yourself, there is plenty," I said feeling like an indentured servant and as if I were giving away the spirit of the man I forever will love.

If he were alive, he’d love it back here in 2006.

It’s gorgeous in Brooklyn today.

Bumble bees are flying around already. I wonder where they were all winter.

I have officially claimed all the land in this rather large lot.

I have cut my garden in two this year, and constructed a path of stone down the center of the 8 foot by twenty-foot space, now available for any seed of my choosing. Now I can tend to my crops without stepping in the dirt by walking down my stone path, barefoot.

Last year, my garden was too wide. I wasn’t able to easily weed the crops that were mid-way in the eight foot wide space without stepping on the soil.

The secret to growing abundant crops is to not step in the dirt that surrounds them. Plants like soil that is loosened– so the air can reach the roots, like it has reached me on the Eve of this Easter.

Sometimes I like to come back here in the morning for my first cup of Joe before shoveling off to my nine to five. I put on my white terry cloth robe and walk back here with a green watering urn and give my little girls a drink before the sun comes up over the branches of the apple and cherry trees which are planted next door.

Sometimes I wish I actually did hear voices like most Schizophrenics do so that I could hear what my dead lover has to say about the garden I planted in his memory today.

The apple and cherry trees with pretty blossoms which now overshadow me are the property of the landlord next door. Their branches tower over the new bench I made from slate rock under their shade.

In past years, those pretty white flowers above me lasted for about three weeks before the green leaves of the trees take over the twigs of their trunks.

I’ve pruned the apple and cherry tree this year– I never had the nerve to cut back someone else’s trees until today. If I didn’t hack off those branches, my Four O’Clocks, parsley, lettuce and dill would not get enough light to germinate.

There’ s still at least five by seven feet of space left to plant my zinnias and other annuals when the farmer’s almanac and moon in the sky tell me that it’s time.

As I was pulling out dead leaves and rotted apples from between large stones while cleaning out the back yard I came across a sprouting apple seed from the core of the brown fruit that somehow kept itself in tact throughout the long cold winder.

I planted the little seedling in the eight foot wide square of my city garden. When I look closer, I notice that two of the seeds from the rotted apple core are sprouting forth.

Their little green heads are smaller than my pinky nail. But one day, two apple trees will grow here on Dekalb Avenue– and symbolize the love I still have for one of the many flowers I picked as husbands in my life.