Terry Trowbridge
Ginger Learns
Lighting strikes the ground.
A ginger root begins to grow.
Lightning strikes the ground around.
The ginger root grows another node.
Upheavals and epochs.
Lightning strikes the rocky tor.
The ginger root, held in a crag, grows another node.
Ginger now has a root with two nodes.
A mouse bites the ginger root.
Aftertaste of lightning.
The mouse is wide-eyed, never sleeps again,
except during thunder storms.
Avalanche dislodges the crag.
For a minute, the ginger root becomes thunder.
Another node joins the root like cumulus cloud.
The forest is gone, and the snow stays far away.
The ginger leaves sway in a growing wind.
Heat lightning strikes the prairie.
Another node appears.
A hoofy ruminant trots past.
The ruminant returns and sniffs the wide leaves.
The smell of electricity spirals into the sky.
The ginger wonders if roots are a kind of antlers.
Continental shelves clutter each other.
The prairie is a mesa.
Hare and groundhog abound.
They are architects. The ginger feels tunnels that extend from dens.
Ginger feels tunnels and dens.
Ginger decides to let go of the lightning.
A plant must leave behind the seed,
and become an architect of itself.
Terry Trowbrdige Pushcart Prize nominee, researcher & farmer Terry Trowbridge’s poems are in Pennsylvania Literary Journal, Carousel, Lascaux Review, Kolkata Arts, Leere Mitte, untethered, Snakeskin Poetry, Progenitor, Miracle Monocle, Orbis, Pinhole, Big Windows, Muleskinner, Brittle Star, Mathematical Intelligencer, Journal of Humanistic Mathematics, New Note, Hearth and Coffin, Synchronized Chaos, Indian Periodical, Delta Poetry Review, Literary Veganism and ~100 more. His lit crit is in BeZine, Erato, Amsterdam Review, Ariel, British Columbia Review, Hamilton Arts & Letters, Episteme, Studies in Social Justice, Rampike, Seeds, and The /t3mz/ Review. His Erdös number is 5. Terry is grateful to the Ontario Arts Council for his first writing grant.