My plum and cherry blossom are profound,
I will try to manage more than one single cherry this year.
As for those moths which get inside your plums –
you can get some sort of pheromone trap. They’re green.
You’ve left the lemon yellow flowers on last year’s
black kale for long enough.
The cardoon which used to flourish from
underneath the corner of the shed has barely sprouted.
Remember last year you planted purple beans
too soon – they shivered to a shrivel.
I like the way you leave the aquilegias
wherever they may grow.
There’s hope of purple broad beans,
maroon tomatoes, custard yellow courgettes,
an orange squash streaked with green –
which should be very sweet.
You could try again with aubergines.
This is the only future you can grow.
You Mistake Yourself for an Allotment by Chrissie Gittins | Poetry Reed Diffuser
CHRISSIE GITTINS lives in London. Her poetry collections are Armature (Arc), I’ll Dress One Night As You (Salt) and Sharp Hills (Indigo Dreams). She appeared on BBC Countryfile with her fifth children’s poetry collection, Adder Bluebell, Lobster (Otter-Barry Books). She has received a Hawthornden Fellowship, an Author’s Foundation and two Arts Council awards, and she features on the Poetry Archive. Her short story collections are Family Connections (Salt) and Between Here and Knitwear (Unthank Books).
