If you were here today,
to celebrate Mother’s Day,
I would plant an herb garden for you.

Come summer, you could have
the bright taste of parsley in chilled tomato soup
and quirky lemon balm in your tea
– in winter, a leaf of sage
in your favorite butternut squash.

Year to year, some of the plants,
like basil and dill,
would need to be replaced –
but who doesn’t like an excuse
to buy a new Easter dress?

Heartier herbs go round and round.
You’d always find steadfast rosemary
right where we’d put her, while sweet mint,
that gadabout, would spring up
wherever space allowed

amidst spires of pencil holly,
among the showy iris, rubbing
leaves with the sociable butterfly bush.

And versatile lavender, cool and warm,
would be heavy enough to touch you,
her scent woven into the memory of air.