Pat Hegnauer
About this Christian Poet:
Pat
Hegnauer has been an acting teacher, producer, actress and director. She
founded and produced four theaters in Newport, RI, and acted as artistic
director for 2nd Story Theater for twenty years.
Presently she's a playwright and poet. Her plays have been produced in Providence, RI, at Perishable Theater, 2nd Story Theater, and in New York City at The Raw Space, and Tribeca Theater. Her plays have had staged readings at University of Rhode Island, where she won Best New Playwright award in 1996 and 1997, the Middleboro Arts Festival, Middleboro, MA, and the Sandra Feinstein Gamm Theater, Providence, RI.
Pat's poems have been published in The Crone's Nest, Scriveners Pen, Moon Dance, The Newport Review, Skywriters Literary Journal, and The Great Swamp Gazette. Her first chapbook, A Few Uncompromised Letters, was just published by the Premier Poets Chapbook series.
Mr. Domingo's Garden
Between garage and fence
the garden wakes and waits
for Mr.Domingo's attention.
He
fawns in her seasons,
adores her harvest and fallow.
She responds greening for love.
Leaves
shiver as he nears,
sprout to fruit reaching
to kiss the old man's hands,
soothe
the arrogant arthritis
and the thin fiery bone
that digs and seeds and tends.
Tomatoes
swoon off stems
falling heavy in his palm,
peas grow attentive on string,
cukes
hide for him to seek
in prickly vines tangled
where fat beets jump
purple
from the earth
in the morning damp rows.
I hear him recite Italian,
sing
opera as he weeds
or waters the evening bed
chanting his daily prayer
bent
beside the fence,
then tip his raggedy hat
to a mockingbird's aria.
Copyright©2002 by Pat Hegnauer