April 23
CRUMPLED PETALS IN MY POCKET
I can’t bring back the bloom. Cohesion, lost in ripeness, is left only to
memory. I carry home the parts, folded,
petite, fragrant bedding for my wistful desires. I put these colored remnants into a jar of salt. I make an aromatic rub for the sweetest of
wounds. Transforming the parts to useful
duty doesn’t restore the flower. It
doesn’t pay tribute to the past; it is survival. I have a mind filled with roses but I must
make hay. Today, I live. Today, the rose is dead, its pieces in my
pocket. I don’t die with the blossom,
though my head blows in the wind. The
rose runs its course. I run mine.
Line your clouds with anything you like.
*
Coming Home to Work
I have arrived home to a beehive;
everyone industrious,
everyone filled with purpose,
everything buzzing right along.
My response to this of course is anger.
I have a sting and I want to use it.
I have a place it falls into yet I fear falling.
The living world is now opened to me,
but my destination had been death for so long
that the prospect of diligence ignites steel blue fury.
I divide my time between gratitude and rage.
I want to accuse myself, rescue myself,
then I remember everyone in this place too
has a buzz, a stripe and a stinger.
You are reading selections from Sober on the Way to Sane
and More Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault
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