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It's been almost six months since I moved out my have home of a decade and this past week I finally repotted almost all of my 20ish indoor and outdoor plants. I have recently become obsessed with my plant babies and their comfort. As I grow into my new apartment I have wanted the same for them...a larger space, more space to breath. My outdoor deck has become filled with flowers of lantana, jasmine, and soon heliotrope. The new sweet bay tree greets me as I walk in and out of my apartment and my indoor plants bring me so much joy as I slumber near them.
I feel when they need water, a friendly hello, or sometimes even a brush of my hand for sweetness.
Really, as I've repotted them I've repotted parts of myself. And then I found a magical poem called "Re- potting" by Elaine Dunstan and felt an immediate need to post it.
Re- potting
By Elaine Dunstan
I remember now
what my father taught me
with his green and gentle hands
fingernails caked with earth.
The roots need breaking up, He's say
before re-potting.
Otherise, the plant on't grow
because it's still bound
by the shape
of it's first pot.
I would watch, transfixed
as He gently yet firmly
un-binded the roots
some would get torn
ripped apart by necessity
freeing this plant
from it's rigid shape
I wondered,
did it hurt.
How long I sat
with the same shape
my roots, pot bound
by fear of change.
Perhaps it as fear
of ho it might feel
hen necceissity's ifingers
prised them apart, tearing
at the knon, breaking me free
for bigger things.
I re-pot my on plants no
gently unbinding the roots
just like how he showed me
tearing where necessary.
Shaking the soil from the tangle
as the dirt clods fall
my tears go with them
it does hurt.
Placing the little plant
in a bigger pot.
I smile.