Poem Renaissance – Lisa Ashley

Gyroscope Review is celebrating National Poetry Month with a Poem Renaissance, a review of previously published poems looking for new life and new views. Every day through May 20^th, a new poem to fall in love with all over again.

Breaking Ground
by Lisa Ashley

When our father enters the room
we get out of his chair.
My mother serves him first—
macaroni, beef, boiled beans.

We pick rocks that rise out of soil each year
as if summoned from the Susquehanna riverbed.
We pull weeds, clean the soil for tomato plants,
the corner patch for squash.

I work beside him
bent under the weight
of his insults about Mother—
She smells like a dead fish down there.

I return when my son is three
reluctant to enter the storm center,
house stuffed and filthy,
the garden a wandering jungle.

We search for plant remnants
in that tired soil, walk
crooked rows looking
for stray green beans,
treasures my son spies
beneath broad leaves.
Stones ping our rusty buckets.

Dead now, the old man, his garden.

Back home my son takes small stones
from his pocket, places them
one by one in the dirt
beside his young tomato plant.

First published in The Journal of Undiscovered Poets, 2021.

Lisa Ashley’s debut book, Oubliettes of Light was a finalist for the Sally Albiso Award, 2024. Lisa descends from Armenian genocide survivors. As a chaplain, she spent many years listening to, and supporting incarcerated youth.She earned a BA in journalism from the University of Montana School of Journalism, and a Master of Divinity from Seattle University. Her poems can be found in Gyroscope Review, Willows Wept Review, Juniper, Blue Heron Review, The Healing Muse, Amsterdam Quarterly, Thimble, Wild Greens,Last Leaves, and others. She was a 2021 Pushcart Prize nominee. Lisa writes in her log home among the firs on Bainbridge Island, WA.

Don’t forget to read the Spring 2025 Issue, available now, online and in print

Previous Renaissance Poets

April Poets

May Poets