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Garden Variety Democracy
By Philip Luckey
Tilling the dirt
To reveal riches:
Sometimes the changes are easily apparent
Or the growth inches along slowly, steadily,
Just as a seed pokes out a tender shoot
And unfurls young leaves for future fruits.
Saturday morning at her assigned spot
Sarah tends her plot of vegetable plants:
Some water here, some weeds pulled there,
Propping up a leaning sprig
While sweat drips from her head and neck.
Though she’s already labored so many weeks
And the next harvest still so far away
Yet she hopes for good weather and a decent yield
Here in her field invested with faith.
I remember sitting knee to knee
A small group of us, maybe as many as five
On plastic hard chairs
In the high school gymAs we spoke of what we valued
And shared what we wanted to see.
Our shepherd (okay, Facilitator)
Helped us winnow and tend
To our ideas on the easel
Written with black Sharpie
Aimed for future growth.
“How are your tomatoes, Sarah?”
The man from his neighboring spot asks.
She sighs,
Lifts away green leaves to reveal
The smaller-than-expected progress
Of her careful work.
Hopefully it’ll rain again tomorrow.
Hopefully it will rain.
A few weeks after
My session in the gym
I went to a meeting
(Square pavilion, every wall of glass)
Where all those scribbled ideas
Had been compiled and compared
Categorized into themes
(Not just from my small huddle,
But from hundreds more
Throughout our town).And then we decided
Our next step to take
Together.
Finally, the green beans, the tomatoes,
The bell peppers, the squash
Were ripe enough to gently tug away
And carefully place in Sarah’s basket.
As she collected this food
Warmed by the response of the soil
And seed (and yanked weeds, and bugs removed)
Sarah felt thankful for her square,
Her small portion of the community garden.
Next season, she mused…
What should I plant next?
I read another article in the paper
About surprises in my town:
An idea for an aquarium by the river?
A walkway down to the dam?
People talking now about new parksAnd new homes, and more —
Though really not a surprise to me
Because I remembered that small huddle
Under that gym’s sodium vapor lights
Sowing seeds on an easel
For plants to grow
Into organized efforts
That led to community change.
Tilling the dirt
To reveal riches:
How like a garden we are.
Next season, next week, next door, we muse…
What should we plant next?
Meet the Poet – Philip Luckey
I call myself a Communication Generalist, because I try to communicate better using a wide variety of methods, and to help other people share with each other, too.
I record and edit videos and documentaries and livestreams, typically for nonprofits, music, art, dance, ministry, and education. I also write and design and use lighting and teach and facilitate meetings — in short, I’m a storyteller and problem-solver.
Having lived most of my life in the Chattanooga area, I’ve been fascinated by reading and writing since I was a young pup. I started writing down my poems when I was a teenager, and in high school a poem of mine won an award and was published in a local anthology. Poetry has been a continual (though at times infrequent) source of expression for me throughout the years. Lately, I’ve been meaning to concentrate on creating more poetry, and this Democracy Poetry Pathway project came at just the right time to encourage me.
As I like to say, our communities are content-rich, but distribution-poor. I try to help how I can, with my involvement in the Red Bank Public Art Advisory Board, the Chattanooga Venturing Study Group, the Rotary Breakfast Club, the Nightfall Music Advisory Committee, Opera Tennessee, and others. My hope is for each of us to ultimately learn the best ways to create our own stories to share with each other.
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