underneath the crust of spring.
I reckon years ago somebody
lost it, swatting at some bee
sipping at the tight, bright button
of a zinnia just before it bloomed.
Popped it right off.
Then every spring turning
the mulch to tender it all up
for lilies, cosmos, coreopsis,
that button folded down and down,
halfway to China,
that’s what we would say,
digging in our mother’s garden,
longing for adventure as she
was longing for a kind of beauty
in our buttoned-up backyard.
And now this button in my own,
its color worn away to dirt.
Still, I like to picture her,
whoever she might be,
gloved hands like mine upon a trowel.
Maybe in the autumn, planting bulbs
for spring, her old waxed jacket
fraying at the hem, and now
I’ve lost a button, too, she’ll say,
to no one in particular.
Here it is, I answer.