Sage Poem by Gert Strydom

I planted some sage along
with other herbs
and got small bushes
with blue-purple flowers
and greyish-green leaves.

We used the sage
in the cooking
and sometimes in salads
to flavour it,
but in my mother’s garden
at the front gate
a gigantic blooming bush of sage
greeted me
as if I was setting my foot
into Eden itself.

It was almost a metre high
and twice that breadth
and almost similar in shape
as the neighbour’s rondavel
across the street
and I rubbed some leaves
between my fingers
and it smelt like mint to me.

[Reference: rodavel = a type of round brick hut with a grass roof.]