Green Reigns

The sky is breathing hard and each gust
brings a shower of papery discs
shed by the giant elm. They litter the lawn,
form drifts at the curb. I pick at weeds
while he prunes the boxwoods.
We deadhead daffodils. Tough love, he says.
Meanwhile, green reigns. Firm, Lilliputian
buds are on the dogwood, lilac, hydrangea.
In the hemlock and yews, a new brightness
at each terminus.

These months have strained like rain
on a gargoyle, carefully shaped sandstone
rendered unrecognizable. He still looks
at me with pleasure, but we are changing again.
It’s not settling into some state of nature.
It’s what comes after gray days when the sound
of me dropping a knife and the tone of his voice
put us each on edge, after the things we’ve said.
Not even they are forever. In this glorious re-greening
something comes next for us, too.

Emily Updegraff is an MFA student at Northwestern University and has published poems in Third Wednesday, The Orchards Poetry Journal, River and South Poetry Review, and other journals. She works as a university administrator and is a regular book review contributor at Great Lakes Review.