After Galway Kinnell

After Galway Kinnell
for Nancy at Abingdon Square Garden

Moving two pumpkins off the clover
she reveals a patch of solid dirt
and then a metal plate which lifts off
to give access to the water valve.
With a metal fork, she pries the scuttle open.
Next, she walks towards the green
eel-like hose she'd plopped down
at the garden entrance; she places the keys
into her pocket with a clink clink clink.

Standing on the port of the north ridge, she
swings around at the helm of the garden plot.
She is the Captain of this botany ship
her low vessel a chain-fenced oval
with a deck of green grass, ornamental
kale and purple hemlock peeking
a few stands of wild flowers each
a deeper indigo shadowed with bits
of orange autumn shafts of sun light.

At the edge of the coral ridge
she aims the spigot of her hose
and a rush of water sprays forth.
She stands at the head of the garden patch.
A younger woman sits starboard side
reading her phone punching a Morse text.
Three dogs on a single leash follow a woman
decked in pink. On a nearby bench
an older woman talks a dogwatch
with her friend seated in a wheelchair.

The Captain holds the hose, her eyes closing
a bit to shield the autumn shafts of light
her hands dripping with water
at the mainstay of the urban garden.
The Captain casts nets of raindrops,
throws a spray shroud over the plants.
Fishing up and forgetting themselves, the plants
transform into sea anemones, urchins. A lone
daisy becomes an octopus swimming
in the waves from which all of it flailed slipway
drowning or surviving each fittest species
sharks, seals, whales each one
takes a long drink forgetting stamens,
rejecting chlorophyll and renouncing roots.

Shaking off the dust. Lifting up their visages
to drink in the ocean forgetting
the air, drinking instead drops of heaven
and cloud. Even the sparrows imagine
themselves as herring gulls.
When the garden has drunk itself to satiety
the woman at the edge steps back
quartering to turn off the water,
but she hobbles a bit, almost falls
as if the watering made her forget
she had legs for land.