Megan Baldrige
I’ve been awaiting you,
dear friend June:
you who woo me,
make me swoon.
Sashay over, show me shimmer;
Let’s bust hot moves, let’s get glimmer.
Give me sun, I’ll show you skin;
let’s open doors, stay light late, let fresh air in.
But, I beg you, my promiscuous,
permissively pollinating
Junebug mistress:
enough elm mischief!
That seedy elm gang has my yard discovered,
my just-watered vegetables covered
by tufts of diaphanous stuff
fluttering in a hover of shifting grifty tough fluff.
Every June
I’m over-elmed,
unsettled, rattled, locked in battle, not ready to coddle,
ready to throttle the elms and you.
So, dear June, no more elm pollination,
nor elm-baby procreation;
no more elm seeding, nor elm feeding.
I can’t be twenty-four/seven million-elm weeding.
June, repeat after me:
I will no longer
reseed
the Siberian elm tree!
Megan Baldrige is a gardening poet who wrote the book of poetry, Cultivating Weeds about her battles with insects and elm seeds. She tries to garden in Albuquerque, New Mexico.