Tuesday, July 18, 2023

the flower that grows in the dark


Monotropa uniflora



 the flower that grows in the dark

 

What we define as human tenderness troubles

each of us differently.

                                    Ada Limon

     for Ruthie

it’s not just the ghost

flower rising white as hairless

 

mice but last night’s

spider come to cat’s-

 

cradle the tips

of the little globes

 

barely latched stitches here

seen just post dawn.  something

 

in this simple resilience

is akin, given the decay

 

of the place, to a quiet

moving through, up by

 

last fall’s old growth

going slowly back

 

to soil.  imagine how they are

pushing up from below

 

their very bottoms

and casting their lots

 

casting off true

into any wind or humidity

 

what chance or small winged

thing may latch, flit a bit

 

in the stick, or picture it, someone

leaning in after that, to

 

examine it for a wound,

and seeing naught, to let it go.