Gorse

The Northeast corner of
of our local organic food store
Wild by Nature
has that smell.
You know the one.
The one you don’t exactly like
but are attracted to
a kind of witchy brew
of dried herbs,
essential oils, vitamins and incense.

It was there I saw the
“Discover Your Remedy” display,
built of wood, promoting nature.
It was divided into seven sections,
and each of the sections
was divided into subsections
that housed sets of small brown bottles
of labeled remedy.

Only one sub-section was sold out.

Gorse.

I wondered what it was about Gorse
That made it so needed.

I opened the small
drawer of descriptions
in the display,
thumbed down the list
to see.

It said:
The Positive Effect of Gorse is Hope.

*

Marcia Cardelús is an 83-year-old poet from New York. She has been writing for most of her life but has never submitted her poems until now. A chance encounter resulted in her first published poem — The Señora in the Blue Sweater — that appeared in Res Magazine in April, 2023.