By Meg Yardley

We have noticed your rosemary is overgrown.

We have observed that your lavender has gone woody.

Panicgrass sprouts up in every patch of dirt,

and juniper bushes bulge out with dark green prickles.

We see that you don’t sweep your walkway daily,

or even monthly. And we think you ought to know

that the little creeping red vine with its tiny pink flowers

is splitting up your concrete.

We have not overlooked the scooped out dirt

of the hole your son dug three months ago

to see how far down he could tunnel (which wasn’t very far,

but you didn’t want to hurt his feelings by filling it in).

We have witnessed how the rosebushes

(though bearing gorgeous dark red blossoms

from time to time) stick out

at strange angles around the overgrown rosemary.

And if we could see the squirrel-chewed

half-rotting orange of your back yard persimmons,

our faces would set grimly

with professional displeasure.

We are here to help. Pay us

and we will set it right for you,

all of it. We will trim your hedges.

We will prune your plants.

We will shape your trees.

We will raze your trailing vines.

At last no one will be able to see

the mess you’ve made of your life.

Meg Yardley lives in the San Francisco Bay Area. Her writing has recently appeared or is forthcoming in publications including Salamander, SWWIM, Cagibi, Mom Egg Review, Glass: A Journal of Poetry, and the Women’s Review of Books.