Perennial
It can be like this. One day
to wake up thinking goldenrod. Coneflower.
Not as suggestions, but directives.
So that you load the children in the car
and go. And it can be
that you hold a trowel
in your hand, your thighs scuffed
with dirt and manure, your face
likewise streaked, when you see,
for the first time in years,
someone you once loved.
It is then you wonder
what would have happened
if you rose from bed thinking: tiger
or lily. Or if
you had stayed
that one night long ago.
But you are here.
And for a moment, you follow
that staircase again, open the old
apartment door. Stand in the bedroom
on that familiar, uneven floor
with a trowel in your hand, a hole at your feet,
and your daughter, eyes bright like daisies,
asking what you saw.
