I have a soft spot for this poem because it’s simple. I read it and it gives me hope. I think when I wrote it, I needed a spring. I think we all need to know right now that, even though it is spring, spring as we know it will return. I hope it gives you a feeling of that hope today also. We all need that right now.
Petals
The cold air of December.
Your lips were cracked.
I cut the dead petals of a flower in our apartment.
Staring out the window notice
The hem of a skirt dirtying in the winter slush.
Sometimes what no one tells us saves us.
Her aimless smile continues to trudge forward.
I smile as I trim my plant thinking about how much I like her.
I like people that are unbothered by things I would fret over all day.
I stare at the petals in my hand and think
About how, over the course of the fall,
My dreams drifted into the flowers
And they began to droop and shrivel and disappear.
The crinkled remnants of my plant in the open palm of my hand.
A moment… I am almost sad,
But then I think of that woman
And the hem or her skirt
And how she has somehow learned not to
Let simple things muddy her.
I am able to throw the petals away
Staring at my plant thinking of new petals will come
Suddenly I’m anticipating a colorful spring.
