Birthmark

Five about Flowers

 Five about Flowers One summer I could not walk into one of the rooms where we lived without first seeing them spread about, watered, in handfuls. Daisies. ■  Remember this story about the couple, when they were dating he had given her flowers, & she hid them in a book, let them dry in between the pages. Petals became paper & the paper petals. ■  The bulbs you can break apart like loaves of bread, the damp husk smell that stays on your skin for days until one night, there is no washing it away, you wake from it lingering on her lips. Pink flowers, petals caught in a sway. ■  They want you to think that the fireworks, brilliant streaks of green & pink, are like flowers in the night sky, but the ash rains down on the crowd. The papery blackness, pieces of the dome no one has ever seen, burns. ■  In the papery white smoke stretching like a wing from the side of the train. This wing spreads across the platform & joins with others waiting to leave. Some hang out of windows & try to reach those below—There now, someone says & lifts up roses, knocking against the cold glass. Trying to get your attention. ...