Primrose Cottage
from Wind-lashed Teacup (2021)
Primrose Seaside road Marie plants a hemlock bungalow With empty shells as fenceposts East gate garbler Still hears the surf Seascape gardener Tips the shovel toward the north Muttering “rhew” Elder word for frost Eves of scraping oysters Have dulled her tendency toward rock. A man with a harmonica writes a letter There are canyons in the cream of her tea Darjeeling highland Old woman tips an oil lamp Toward the valleys of memory Faint smog over the oolong Mourns the Himalayas. With primroses in her fenceposts The gardener plants six clamshells For ancestors in the Atlantic Jazz musicians shuck oysters On the shore outside her cottage Humming a tune about primrose. Her grandmother sings a melody Clipped out of an old newspaper About eating ice-scoured mollusks. Apply keyhole limpets to hemlock And a glow beyond the doorway And buds east in the Himalayas. She opens the primrose cottage Back into the sand.
