Weeds

For just happening to be
in the wrong place
you are well maligned

labelled parasite
invader trespasser
in short non grata

the unwelcome guests
with no plan to depart
in the near future.

The laidback scroungers
who make their bed
wherever they creep.

But with such poetic
names to live up to,
you have nothing to prove

but unwind your thriving plot
where you ought not
(like that lawn where you intrude).

Crabgrass, Goosegrass,
Quackgrass (whatever name
you choose to bind and abide by)

wasn’t it a blade of grass
that old Whitman rhapsodised
as the handkerchief of the Lord?

As far as metaphors go,
that’s certainly arresting,
but even God’s handkerchief

shouldn’t be seen waving
through cracks in one’s decking
or pride-of-joy crazy paving

not to mention hyjacking
one’s Zen-inspired pathway,
its gravel now the backing

for your foreground breeding.
But is it wise to uproot
your silent parable

of live and again let live?
See how the very stones
are more than content

to forget and forgive –
rubbing easy shoulders
with your green insurgence.