A Lost Garden

She used to plant over 500 gladiola bulbs in her back garden every spring. Glory Red. Trumpet Orange. Wedding White. Passion Pink. Summer Yellow. Some bulbs she planted in clusters of color and when the glads rose up on their slender yet sturdy, green stalks and unfurled their flowers, the garden was arrayed with swathes of red, orange, white, pink, yellow. But most of the bulbs she mixed up together in a bag, and as she planted, drew bulbs at random. She would plant 20 bulbs a day over a few weeks, and so the flowers bloomed steadily throughout the summer; the garden wealthy with color and joy.

But she does not plant gladiolus any more.

There was a time when she laid on her back with her children on the green grass in the yard, and looked up at the apple tree as it bloomed, watched as its delicate white flowers turned into green, hard fruit that later ripened and dropped down to their waiting hands.

But she no longer whiles away the time under the apple tree. And the fruit lies rotting upon the ground.

She always planted seeds on Good Friday, poking the rich brown earth with her fingers, whispering secret words over the seeds as she thought of renewal and homecoming.

But no seeds fall from her hands to the earth below now.

Not so long ago, she tended terra cotta pots of daffodils and blue ceramic pots of narcissus that lined the front walkway every February. Later, she would use the pots for silver sage and white lobelia.

But now the walkway is lined with shards of red as dark as old blood and a blue that is faded and weary, and no one walks up the path any more.