The thin skin of your stomach I have stretched loose,
leaving scars like pale-pink garden columns. The proof
of past harvest: the purple dale where the doctor twice
sliced you deep. And other silent places, invisible

caverns where I’ve left carved etchings, eroded
the sharpest edges; chiseled my impressions
into the hardest parts of you. I’ve watched
your crooked back as you tend my grounds
under the naked sun of our thin blue days.

And now that those days are nearly done
and your tending the garden is over, I’ve seen
my own child scribble in your tired eyes. Let me
hold your hand, let me tell you this now:
Mother, I love this land that I have made of you.