The Prizefighter's Gardenby Jeanne René

Papa had a voice, romantic and rich. A voice whose timber echoed the clamor of carts pulled by donkeys down uneven cobble stone streets and whose vibrato quivered like the bulging muscles of dusty day laborers. His song at the dinner table, given to only to daughters and son ... and to brown-eyed granddaughters ... was sometimes a field of wheat dancing on an easy breeze, and other times a hammer against steal rivets. He could have out-sung any Caruso of his day... or today's Pavarotti, but he never stepped out of the grandma's kitchen or wide-armed sofa. His audience wept just the same.


Papa was born in Sicily ... Palermo. Family was everything. He had been a boxer. He eventually became quite a successful business man with a plastering company ... and he loved his garden.

Under his arbor ~

Plump passionate
Fuchsia bells spill
Moss painted terracotta swaying
Pushed by butterflies
In heavy hands
He held my face to their flesh
To discover nature's miracles
The grace of the flower
The grace of the man
Here beat my heart along with time
Papa walked me round his garden
In stages of my bloom

In his arms ~
To the loquat’s
Dusty fruit
Breaking its amber meat
For my anxious fingers to my lips
Spitting seeds into the fish fountain
Strolling over the flagstones
From bud to blossom
Laughter lifts his heavy brows
To the buzz of monster bee
As I shelter in the warmth of his neck
Until he sets me down
With well picked mums

With his hand ~
Papa walks me round his garden
To the swoon of the gardenias white
A skip ahead and turn around
Twirling sour grass on the tip of my tongue
Every Sunday to the rose path
Near the window sill
Sauces stewing for the evening meal
Blend with beauties bittersweet
Papa hums the old man river
Of life
Of love
And in my hands four quarters fold
Behind my ear a sprig of thyme

By his side ~
Papa walks me round his garden
Slow in the evening
Sweet song of final days
Hushed in the beauty of the peony
Revealing secrets before it quickly fades
By the fish fountain as the wicker rocks
He whispers now in harmony with the breeze
Of every cut and bruise held in his glove
To say I’ve been
You will be
Time to listen
Under the shade of the cherry tree

~And
The stray leaf that falls against my cheek today
Perhaps his kiss


jeanne rené 4/04.........for Papa, my grandfather, who taught me the joy of gardening.