Government Nursery

1

I offer you the ravine

of a ruled sheet

for the saplings you’ve brought

from Majkhali.

Dug with my hands,

the pits are ready,

the space between them

the width of a finger.

Exotic or native,

the soil adapts to the plant

it receives.

Tell the school children

waiting for the bus,

who ask you the time

when they see you come by,

that posterity’s the only

game in town.

They only have to look

at the trees

crowding your ravine.

2

Unnoticed,

lying on its side

without rim

or bottom,

in the broken

terracotta pot

the periwinkle

still puts out

rustic leaves and

a pink flower, wide-

eyed and solitary.