xcavations

He died. She stirred. And she dug up his garden.
​
Her rhythmic pickaxe swung in active arcs,
the banked bushes exposed to latent hiss,
the roots and tendrils snaking into sun.
A cart load of earth's weight had been shifted:
the rescue romance once buried and sealed
no longer her comfort's protective shield.
She now had lost her safety barrier
and dug a return to the solace hymns.
Never giddy, with grounded certainty,
and solid, sensible shoes, she now knelt.
The bushes' boundary had been removed,
and in the open space her eye line had
been raised for the sight of day to flood in.
Her protector had been inadvertent
in his efforts to deny the shadow
of her showers as they scuttled across.
He never recognised their relevance,
her need to cleanse her feet when walking out.
​
She stood and hummed hopes of new horizons,
and climbed out to greet the light beyond graves.