Photo by Pawel Czerwinski on unsplash
The gardener
Mother, every morning, you stumble out of bed,
bovine and groggy from hot feverish dreams
to see your flowers bloom.
Under the plush scarlet light,
you regard their darling faces tenderly. Your sweet smile
floating in the sultry air.
The marigold leavens
like a pumped-up dough, happiness
rippling its brilliant yellows;
and the guileless, moon-faced crepes
bubble with soul.
You simply can't bring yourself to stuff them
with your swarm of jealous, stinging bee-words,
empty of conscience.
You even adore the cheeky roses
that occasionally assert themselves
through their thorny backtalk.
In them you try to find the child
I have drowned in me.
You gently brush their heat-struck heads,
their broad leaves shaped like hands,
but you refuse to soothe
the disquiet sea of past scars
that relentlessly bruises my numb heart-shore
as I lie in my bed, caught, rooted
in the gaunt deciduous forest of barbed thoughts.
