I slide the glass door
In wafts
smell of thyme
mint and lavender travel, too,
but thyme
the stronger scent
reaches me first.

Thyme,
lord of herbs,
travels first —
lavender and mint
close on her
heals.

This thyme’s a woman,
three times the lady
I am.
I but planted her
grounded her roots;
her powers are her own.

I remember past thymes —
jarred
preserved
irradiated —
big-city, rushed-life thymes; or
bagged and tagged
tea-thymes that
by their very de-naturement
could not be a patch on this thyme,
the thyme before me,
the thyme that might heal all wounds.

This thyme
I’ve got it right.
I pluck it gently
savour it fully.

There’s no present like my thyme.