Finally, The Blossom
Finally, the blossom.
After all of the death I was not prepared for, secretly thinking no one would ever die.
After the long dry spells, dust caking in the corners of my eyes and between my toes.
After all the over-watering, drowning the poor fragile enthusiasms with compensation, gunking them up with expectation.
After you left for good.
After waving goodbye to the young self a dozen times. Let me rest, she screams. What? I scream back. Hands over my ears, I assure us, I can’t make out what you are saying! Years to believe her, years to believe I can go on without her.
After an eternal night of dozing with the confederacy of ghosts – Dad, Peter, Uncle, Louis, Carrie, Bart, Mom, Edwin, Pat – getting cozy under a bed of funeral roses. Then, finally, the blossom on a horizon of another field. Catch a glimpse and catch the scent, the ghosts whisper.
And then I am there, inside and alongside and also in the next field, lovely and solitary and still becoming.
Funeral roses. Yes.