Drowning Lessons: An Anthology of Poetry

Wilted

I used to love flowers

before they became symbols for love

I used to have gardens to tend to

to water, mend, and take care of

To plant flowers of every color

into soft patches of Earth

My thumb used to be so green

bringing life to even the goners

But that's all "has been"s and "used to be"s

And my, have the tables turned

The life is gone

and so is that green thumb

The gardens have wilted

The Earth has dried

and the flowers wilted

Oh how I used to love flowers

but now the garden is dead

Bright colors used to flourish by my window

vases of all kinds littered my shelves and desks

Even as they began to wilt

I kept watering them

in the hopes they'd bounce back

My mother has a gift for that

Don't continue to water a dead flower

unless you're my mom

who somehow manages to bring everything back

My desks and shelves are cluttered 

with dry petals

brown leaves

and cobwebs

but I can't bring myself

to clean the slate

so I leave them there

hoping someone else will come around

and clean is instead

I'm afraid of the further damage

my no-longer-green thumb

will bring

and I'm afraid of the reflection

those flower fragments

portray of myself

so I leave them there

to keep the fear alive

just to remind myself

that maybe I'm not as dead

as my garden