Emily Vance Brown

Reaching blindly in the dark, acorns
still grow roots, even when shut in a metal tin
in a dark, dry room. I should know,
I put them there. I was six years old and
I wanted a forest in my closet. I counted out
one hundred acorns from beneath the post oak
in the front yard, and I waited, and I waited, and
I waited, until I forgot what I was waiting for.
And the acorns grew.

I have been like the roots, too: blind and
dirty, secret, forgotten, reaching out for a shape
that my body could fill, yearning for a ground
to stand on. I was waiting for a void. I was waiting
for a darkness that was empty and still. Everywhere
around me, I imagined signs of life: earthworms, maggots, tiny
living things with names known only to entomologists
and little girls with oversized encyclopedias. I reached
out and felt the walls of my container. Beside me, the
unborn oaks whispered into my ear. They said:
shame cannot be erased; it can only be replaced.

You are not an acorn. You do not need fertile ground
to launch from. We will grow where we land, you and I,
like the wild dandelion seeds sprouting from the broken sidewalk
in front of our old apartment. “Wishing flowers,” I called them.

My love, you must find a way to grow before the first frost hits.
Even in the darkness. Even with no solid ground beneath your feet.

I will hold your hand, but I cannot plant the seed.