The Gardener
feed her
cut lines of poems
watch them
still in water
let them propagate
as words
spring from the stems
new and green
reaching toward
the sun
patience like
the Seven of Pentacles
peeking from
the ground
paper is soil
pen is rain
fertilize
memorize
photosynthesize
sunflowers grow from
cracks of concrete
in city streets
she remembers
tomato vines
in her grandmother's
yard and starts to plant
it all in a pot
Melissa Sutaris is a memoir and poetry writer from Jersey City, New Jersey. She received an MFA from The New School in 2020, and her work has been published in online magazines such as Ovunque Siamo, and Z Publishing's Anthology: New Jersey's Best Emerging Poets. She works as a bartender, facilitates 100-word groups with her peers, and has an ever-lasting wonder for the stories within the human experience.