The New Garden

I return to find a prim new garden—

no bigger than a foyer.

It sits above true earth in planters,

a stoolpigeon shaken by the ankles

until the secret’s out. 

The old one, though, hid nothing.

It seemed to stretch to the horizon

beside the first experiments: A stream

dammed up. A cloud assuming shapes.

The boys rolling down a hill

growing closer to sky.

“The New Garden” is reprinted from Making the New Lamb Take (2007) by permission of Sarabande Books.