Her Bidding is No Chore

“The world is full
of leaf and limb,”

that’s part of what
she said to him,

as he watched men play
on Elysian fields

and lay unsuspecting
on his side and still.

“A storm has come
and torn them hard

by root and stem,
I regret to say

most have landed
in our yard.

And that, my dear,
is where you come in

and the rake
and the broom

and the bagging, then.”

He married once
and he married well

so, he spent the day
where the branches fell.

And, then, at last
he returned to her

full of love and wonder,
breathless, but with

a thing to tell.
How, for the love of her,

and the cause of her,
the common litter

turned to asphodel.

–2016