The Secret Garden
Adapted from my memories of The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett
I have a secret garden. It covers lots of ground.
There should be lots of flowers. But weeds grow all around.
I have no time to tend it. I’ve left it way too long.
Now I’m too sick to go there. You see, I’m not that strong.
There is a wall around it. A lock that’s on its gate.
So no one else can bother. To fix its awful state.
And tell me that I’m foolish. Go out and feel the sun.
I’d rather stay here angry. Who wants to smile, have fun?
But then she came and found the gate and also found the key.
And opened up my private place, and woe what she did see.
But did she lock it up again? And leave it to decay?
Oh no, she tended and replanted things in secret every day.
And as the season passed along, the seeds she planted grew.
And I just lay in bed forlorn, not having any clue,
Of what’d been done, to build anew that place that I had hid.
That place abandoned long ago, the one I wished to rid.
But then, one day she came to me and made me stand up tall.
And led me to that secret place that hid behind the wall.
I did not want to go inside. I’d better, she advised.
I hobbled after her, quite mad. But then, was I surprised!
The garden was quite wonderful, exactly as I’d dreamed.
The colors, scents, and beauty. “But how? And who?” I screamed!
She claimed it was but she alone, “It’s yours,” she let me know.
I didn’t quite know what to say. But said, “You should not go.”
We are now friends, I’m sick no more, because of her, I’m well.
The garden is our place to be, to play, to talk, to dwell.
And it’s no longer secret. Come join us here and stay
For I have learned one should be kind, for that is the right way.
