Lynne Sharon Schwartz

My father had our yard cemented over. He couldn’t tell a flower from a weed. The neighbors let their backyards run to clover and some grew dappled gardens from a seed, but he preferred cement to rampant green. Lushness reeked of anarchy’s profusion. Better to tamp the wildness down, unseen, than tolerate its careless brash intrusion. The grass interred, he felt well satisfied: his first house, and he took an owner’s pride, surveying the uniform, cemented yard. Just so, he labored to cement his heart.