Bad Luck Clovers, By: Linzi Garcia

I used to pick

four-leaf clovers

from the patch in my front yard.

Quickly, though, it seemed

that for every clover plucked,

something else had to die.

I lost friends, family, pets,

everything that came into my care.

I made the connection

and roped off the patch with caution tape,

stopped letting children play

there, stopped the gardener

from mowing it all down.

I haven’t killed anything since.

Linzi Garcia

Bio: Linzi Garcia is the author of Thank You (Spartan Press, 2018) and co-author of Live a Great Story (Analog Submission Press, 2019) and While Away: Travel Poems (Spartan Press, 2022). She is the publicist and a poetry editor for Meadowlark Press. Linzi is a recipient of a 2023 NextGen Under 30 Kansas Award.