by Adrie Rose

First there is
my son, who says, again,
I will be dead
in ten years.

No, no, I say, that’s not
what I said.
He is seven.

By the beginning
of August, the calendula,
the chamomile give up
early, brown pulp
instead of blossoms.
He finds a praying mantis
as long as my hand,
and I say, Wow,
but think,
Is that normal?
There is a single
cicada husk
outside on the trash can, no
others in sight.  

The seasons
are coming loose,
no more casual
debating with friends
or passersby if this
is fall
or not, when
winter may
come, if
it will.

The spring
after Mt. St. Helens erupted,
before I was a child, masses
of morels blossomed.
Delicacies, not
the size of thumbs
but of basketballs yet
inedible,
every pore clotted
with ash.

We will still
be alive, I tell my son
again, you
will still be here.
I do not tell him
which here
is here, which season,
which ground, which
alive.

 

 

---

Adrie Rose writes, works with herbs, and organizes for Extinction Rebellion in occupied Nipmuck and Pocumtuc territory. Her work has previously appeared in Rebelle Society, Plum, Peregrine, Albatross, The Essential Herbal, Poetry Breakfast, and Ibbetson Street Review. Her poem “In the Liminal” was awarded second place in the Robert P. Colleen Poetry Competition. She studied creative writing at Bennington College and the SC Governor’s School for the Arts & Humanities, and is currently a student at Smith College.

Instagram: @gladheartherbals