A Wild Rose
This bridge has arched the lake's narrows
for a century, flanked on either side
by Autumn trees shedding their faded leaves,
blowing with the first snowflakes
across worn gray stones of my spirit.
Six months ago you felt the first pain.
Now you lie in white sterility
of hospice care, continually exorcizing
the feeding tube, a final tether
binding you to earth,
where the morphine pump wheezes
every fifteen minutes
and missionaries advise prayer
to the strength-less living.
Your a**hole oncologist told me your suffering
was none of my business.
I told him to take his prognosis,
as suffocating as the pine cleaner
lingering like miasma
over hallway linoleum,
and get the f**k out.
From the corner of my eye
I spot a wild rose sprouting on the bank
at the base of a haggard maple,
an anomaly in bleak October,
glaring crimson as my resentment,
angry as the dream when I said,
I'll be your will when yours is gone.
Knowing full well it won't survive the winter,
I give fate the finger
from my dismal perch,
just as I gave you two dozen such blooms this Mother's Day.
I'll see you in Spring,
rises the phoenix from my Summer ashes.
The flurries thicken around me
like a gathering of angels.
With eyes stinging
I toss plucked petals of pennies
into the Judas lake
while wishing as hard as I can.
12/31/18
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