The Altruistic Efforts of a Gourd

Are admirable.

From excess water, it forms knobby tumors
So a blind person, coming up empty for odor
And oblivious to the brilliancy of its colorful show
Finds the messages in Braille.

An experienced gourd interpreter

Or a tactile hungry unseeing person
Might, after spending time with the gourd,
Come up with the secrets of the garden
Or life.

In the afternoon,

grief soaked and spent,
I held the gourd and tried to channel its messages
And interpret the earth and the garden that gave and took my father.
It had so much to say
Though I think it mostly spoke about any of us
And not my father
Who would have outspoken the gourd and told it a few things or two.

-Jennifer Lowe
From Hugo House class "The Poetics of Objects", 2012