mountain gardening

i shed a bone last night
& carried it into the woods.
it was not yet white--
still sinewed & greyish.
if i'm being honest, at first,
i tried to put it back.
unsure of where it fit,
i pleaded with the fragment.
asked to stay whole
which is, i am well aware,
a futile effort. but a bone
is a great opportunity 
for a mountain garden.
so, i carried it into 
crowds trees. orange & red leaves
making a damp fire all around me.
a mountain garden is the deepest
kind of planting. digging 
with bare hands into the earth
of the mountain. asking to hide
a secret between her shoulder blades
just to watch it grow.
once, i buried a ring like this.
the ring had a string to 
an old lover. the lover now travel
to the mountain, following
the rings blossoming impulse.
i asked the bone to become
a well or at least a new ridge.
covered it with moss & gravel.
listened as the trees sighed
in gratitude. there is no better way
to dismantle one's self
but to make a garden. i am planning
what each shard will become.
i want to instigate a stream.
cultivate new ruined houses.
rubble for dusk light 
to play in. the bone trembled
in the dirt. i still feel it
from where i lay in bed alone.
above me, a neighbor moves his dresser
back & forth as if she is a wife.
across the street a woman smokes 
endlessly on her porch. 
she's missing four teeth. 
i hope she has a mountain garden too.