Day 20: Handmade gift

• Manja Maksimovič

All the wonderful postcards, cassettes, cakes… So many gifts came to mind but there is one that tops them all.

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Prompt 20: “Write a poem about a handmade or homemade gift that you have received.”

We are two thirds done for this year’s NaPoWriMo! It feels that we’ve only just begun.

How are you generally? I hope you are feeling fine since today is the first day of everything that is to come.

This pantoum is based on a real story. For my birthday years ago back in Slovenia, two friends transformed my overgrown lawn into a neat vegetable garden within a few hours without further notice. I hope and know that karma has been good to these two. This is the loveliest handmade gift that I have ever received.

The garden

Have I ever come home
to a neat garden in rows
where only that morn
I had wilderness grow?

To a neat garden in rows
two men lent their hands,
I had wilderness grow
but they made it let go.

Two men lent their hands
to the gift of their hearts
but they made it let go
for my birthday with love.

To the gift of their hearts
I will always stay true,
for my birthday with love
they made me grow food.

I will always stay true
where only that morn
they made me grow food.
Have I ever come home?

I don’t have any photos of the garden when finished, but here are some from other times, including of the two gardeners. They were born a day (and some years) apart. A hint for natural gardeners: they are Aries.

  • The view from my ex living room in Ljubljana, Slovenia. The garden is down below. This is the orchid that I took with me when I moved.
  • Here the garden is rather covered. Snow was a regular occurrence.
  • Five or so kiwi plants formed a green roof above my terrace. They were also brought and planted by one of the “gardeners” featured today.
  • This pond was a handiwork of my ex. I had gold fish in it and everything.
  • Here they are, both gardeners and my ex of thirteen years on the right. He took care of this bench and the wavy cut of the hedge.
  • Not related, just both Aries people. Thank you for teaching me how to grow food, no matter how I’m not doing it any more. Times will come.
  • This is bestia and amore, when we returned to have a look after I moved away. This garden and house are being let. I hear that the pond is no more. This table I had called “Tuscany table” before I even dreamed of visiting it one day, let alone living here.

For Day 20 of NaPoWriMo 2020

14 thoughts on “Day 20: Handmade gift”

  3. That’s a beautiful homemade gift 🙂
    My friend and then roommate,Titi, who is no longer with us, she once gave me $100 to fill our patio with flowers because she wanted to plant them, but she didn’t know how. Years later, I taught her how to plant all the things at her new home. ❤ Precious memories, thank you for taking me there.

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    1. Agreed, Leya! 🙂 It’s also funny how one of these two guys commented on Facebook than one other time they also fully cleaned my apartment, and asked where the poem was for that occasion. 😀 I used to have something I called Open House. Lots of people over at all times.

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    1. Ahh, thanks, SMSW. Most of the time I have no idea where they come from. I start clicking and there they are! 😮 I keep having opposite thoughts about my daily poems: love – hate – boredom – forced – joy – inspiration – task – job – urgency – obligation – words – power.

      See – I didn’t want to and yet I wrote another one just now. 😀 😀

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply
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