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I'm Major Jackson and this is the slowdown. Last year some friends and I walked my neighborhood's garden tour. We marveled at lush beds of

salvia, pathways of Gardenia, rose-covered terraces,

all of it inspiring, but grossly deceptive.

I thought, I can do this.

I do not have a green thumb to speak of.

Still, I went wild in a nursery. I placed whatever was colourful into my cart, cone flowers, hydrangea, lavender, longwood blue.

At first, not much happened. Several plantings

withered. The bee balm got waylaid by powdery mildew. I didn't even know what powdery mildew was until after this let down.

These beautiful stalks of red spiky flowers that belonged on the set of Jurassic Park suddenly dropped in bunches.

I tried to rescue them with stakes and string, but no doing.

They just flopped. My garden has lutu shade, all of it took a beating from the summer heat.

I had ludu knowledge of garden zones, dead heading, or even the benefits of watering at night versus watering in the morning,

is clear that I am a beginner.

But I am learning, and the bees are now coming to the garden.

People often ask me, can poetry be taught, as if there is a playbook for writing poetry,

guidelines, and steps.

I believe writing poetry, like gardening,

is a gradual accumulation of instinctive habits, observing, tending,

and nourishing one's talent and

...