angelica

There's a strange man bent over the garden

headphones in, world blocked out,

planting perennials one by one,

counting the money somebody will pay

for the services he can provide.

He bobs his head to the music,

bored with the dirt and the color and

the smell of the grass.

Angelica loved this garden.

That was the first thing she said

after she said we were beautiful

and lovely, and she would be happy to

have us at her tenants.

Angelica is a weed of a woman

tall enough to appear unbalanced

on tiny legs, her black hair flying

she speaks English cautiously, with

hums and sighs punctuating,

filling the space when she searches for words.

She used to bring out her gardening stool

in the afternoons, kneel, face stern

speak with the dirt.

The sort of relationship seldom seen:

a language without words, total peace.

no need to search for the correct tense

everything already understood.

And really, for an apartment lawn

everything was shockingly alive

we always said so when we saw her

and she just smiled.

This morning, Manny and I agree:

when people are depressed,

they don't see what they have

even all the beautiful things growing

right around them, in the spring.

But we must not take it

so personally. It is a disease.

She has lost, he says,

30 pounds. I picture

what would be left of her,

in a hospital bed. I tell him

that the garden does not look the same.