by Erin Jones – Dedicated to Alberta Jones

She scatters light to all within her touch
She smiles, and they smile at her gaze
Her garden’s heart to reach and trails to blaze
A mother twenty-four years, but n’er too much
A gardener first, but no one has seen such
A beauty when she laughs in all her ways
She opens to the lost; with life she’ll raise
Five flowers up, and to her legs they clutch
Until they blossom, raise their petals, breathe
And reach the sunlight, shake their leaves and sigh
She gives them soil, water, sunlight, rain
And watches each one grow and shed their leaves
She helps them cut their roots to see them fly
And spreads her smile, warmer than her pain