The Gardens

Image Source, Annie Spratt (Unsplash)

I am overgrown and messy. There are weeds growing in my yard that I will simply never pick. For I have decided to let them grow and overwhelm the gardens. I stopped trying to make the lawn presentable and pretty. I don’t pick out the dying pieces that make the neighbors stare. I will never again have mowed grass or tidy gardens. There are dandelions and wildflowers and roots, bursting from below. There are weeds growing as tall as trees and bent branches hanging over the broken fence. And in the mornings I sit on my porch with a cup of mint tea and admire my work. The unruly nature of the world I have designed. A world in which I do not hide the ugly and bent parts of me. I have become unafraid, unabashed, of the person I was, of the person I have become. It pains me to watch as the neighbors scoff at my unkempt yard. Their faces are those of discontent, as opposed to my embrace of my difference. It is in those quiet mornings that I wish for a world where we all let our gardens overflow. Where my dandelion seeds blow into your yard and bloom into lovely golden weeds. Where I could see the basil leaves my neighbors let flourish on their windowsills, a reminder of their grandfather. A lovely man who fought and died in a war he did not design. Maybe I would know them beyond the people I have imagined them to be; maybe we would trade recipes, and dine under moonlight. Maybe we wouldn’t feel so distant, but maybe we reap what we sow. 

I hope you let your gardens overgrow.

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by Sophia Bosma

(also published in Bloom I06)

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