November Gardener
 
she likes flowers whose names
remind her of young girls
no one wants to play with
Cleome     Acacia     Calantha     Helenium
 
her fingers move
light as wingbeats
through garden bounty
search for beauty now spent
 
she touches
the finished and the flaming
with equal tenderness
 
runs her thumb and forefinger
down the fading stem until she finds
just the right place to
free the now brittle bloom
 
it’s coming she knows
winters here don’t bluff     it’s coming
she knows too
these tiny deaths are not omens
but promises