Falling out

Ghostly bloom

Hand me a rose,
soft as your lips,

then prick me with
the thrill of new zeal
and leave me

to wither alone,
in a garden of thorns

-ours, a carefully curated
greenhouse of illusion,
a poisonous weed,

spontaneous and deadly
as the beautiful oleander-:

a summer dalliance
disrupting my heart's lilt
and hallucinating goodwill.