My Father Raised Roses

My father raised roses from the very root they grew in straight, taunt, magnificent shoots. They stretched high determined to touch the sky’s very brink in blooms of mammoth reds, whites, yellows and pinks. They caught the eye with scented perfumed fragrance that aroused the senses of every passers glance. Long stemmed, petal laden tight budding beauties that swayed rhythmically in the wind as if by duty. Sightseers awed as nature’s bounty prevailed and he pruned and tended them each day without fail. They gave him both joy and pleasure, a satisfaction he found nothing else could measure. In his garden he kept his dreams in secret quiet solitude strengthened by persistence and tenacity imbued. In his heart lay some inner deeper beauty flowing from the scented rose to a hidden unknowing that would be forever him. I went by the house today so many years after he had passed away. Everything was changed, not a rose or bush to spare, and the garden - it was no longer there. Only with my eyes tightly closed could I see and recall the beauty of the rose. The saying then is true for all women and men you never can go home again. Everything changes and passes into time, for a moment, brief as it was, I saw it in my mind. I saw him - just as I remembered, in his element, well and alive tending each bud and blossom where he once thrived. I wanted to embrace, wrap him close against my breast but the vision was his and I was but a guest. For you Pop, Dec.27th, 1983