Relativity

When I first bought the place,
these two city lots
of pine trees and crape myrtles and half-dead boxwoods
and all-dead grass,
I delighted in hour upon hour
of contemplation,
mental meanderings through gardens
that I had imagined first when I was ten and reading
The Secret Garden.

For two years, I worked diligently,
digging and planting,
warring against dandelions and crab grass,
and it was good.
Then I got tired, and I let it go.
And it went.
All my fine work devoured by dandelions,
nibbled and pinched away by crabgrass.

Tonight, after a renewal of efforts,
I looked back on my work, my sweat,
and saw that I had only managed to secure
a little bit of ground,
and I felt rotten,
as if I'd never achieve that vision
that I'd had when I was ten
if I could only manage a little bit of ground
most days.

Then I thought that it had taken
God
over thirteen billion years
to make me
just the way that I am,
and I realized that accomplishment
is relative.