In the Jardín Etno-Botánico

by Carol Sadtler

 
Snaking through mesquite 
and saguaro, a long line 
of jibber-jabber, pink-
necked tourists muffle
the words of the Zapotec
guide who shows us
a geometry of amaranth
and maize
 
we have always planted
in sacred shapes and symbols
 
A couple is squabbling
and teenagers flirt 
as we troop through
a greenhouse of orchids
and damp
 
we capture the rain as
we always have, and cool
in summer with geo-thermal
 
Outside in the healing 
garden, she picks a leaf
from a flowering plant—
crushing delicate green
with her fingers
 
smell this chepil—
a seasoning and vegetable
my people have eaten
for thousands of years
 
People wander and chat
while she tells the old stories—
what flourished and what
remains. Every time
she says—Oaxaca—
 
soft syllables float
from the back of her throat
then blossom and linger
still

 
* * * * *

"In the Jardín Etno-Botánico" was first published in the Bangalore Review.

Carol Sadtler is a writer and editor who receives her best ideas on, in or near the water. Her poems and reviews have appeared in One Art, The Humanist, Bangalore Review, Sky Island Journal, Big City Lit, The Inflectionist, Writers Resist, RHINO, Pacific Review and other publications. She lives in Chicago with her family.