A vast enchanted garden exists right in my backyard—
a transposed cloud from a magical time and place.
Each garden within another—
handmade, intricate lace,
carefully embroidered love tokens.
In May’s perfect Goldilocks weather,
I stroll and let the wind release my worries
while the flowers use them for fertilizer.
Purple, red, white, and yellow irises.
Hushing pink and electric, fuchsia peonies.
Vibrant yellow yarrows
and cookie-cutter-shaped coreopsis.
I let the scents of roses guide me
into the secret arch of the next garden—
a musical amphitheater of soft, sacred fragrances.
A little girl is performing—
magnetically singing and dancing
entrancing her parents with proud captivation.
I then enter the terrace gardens
where a mother lies on the grass.
The gravitational pull too tempting.
She says she is “lost”,
can’t find her husband and two children—
Gleaming, as the lavender field
potpourris her and encases her
around carved castle bushes.
The lingering scent of honeysuckle
draws me to a bridge.
The other side:
the aroma of black-tea steaming out
from a crescent-shaped, tiny house
made from childhood dreams.
A circular fountain cradles beside it
cuddling chestnut leaves—
floating earthly geometric fireworks.
Water tiptoes down a rock waterfall
into a koi fish pond—
their bodies splashed with neon yellow, gold, and orange.
Colors flashing like nightclub lights.
Their long, horse-like tails, elegantly dancing
as monarch and swallowtail butterflies’ wings
blink and clap beside my feathery hair.
Shahrzad Taavoni
Shahrzad Taavoni is a writer, artist, and acupuncturist pursuing an MFA in Creative Writing at the University of Baltimore. Her work has been featured in California Quarterly, Persian Heritage Magazine, Soul Forte Journal, The Closed Eye Open, and is forthcoming in Amethyst Review and Soul Poetry, Prose & Art Magazine.