The Rock in the Garden.

Back in the eighties my Dad started a landscaping business,
It was called New Visions Gardening and Landscaping.
He would let me tag along to get the coffee and sandwiches.
As a teenager I couldn’t drive the back-hoe or do much.

Quite often he would come across a garden
 that had a giant rock sticking out of the ground.
Dad used to call it the Titanic adventure,
Because it often looked like an Iceberg
He would spend hours with the clients discussing what to do.

“We can blast it or paint it or leave it as it is.”
Everyone had a different way of approaching the rock problem.
Some would say blast the bejesus out of it and cover it up.
Others wanted it decorated with bird baths.

In one garden an old man came out and sat on the rock
cross legged and quiet.
I think he was a Buddhist monk.
He said he wanted to leave it alone.
He claimed there was too much destruction already.

I often rode my bike to school and I would go
past his house.
Sometimes he would be meditating to the rising Sun.

One day he passed away and the council
let the neighbours put up a plague on the rock.

“To those who love the world as it is and
do not want to destroy it.”