Poem written for “The Lonely Weed” poetry contest, Craig Cornish, sponsor, March 12, 2026.
They call me weed, as if my name itself is a curse spat between teeth. I do not grow in obedient rows, nor do I beg for the gardener’s hand. Like the poet’s misunderstood words, my roots clutch the cracks of forgotten places~ a shrug, an insolent in a vacant lot. The wind combs through me, rustling my leaves~ and, like a poet, I answer only to that. Like the writer hunched over a page no one will read, I am my own audience. People walk past me, boots scuffing near my face, too busy to notice how I bend but do not break. Oh! What freedom I have in being overlooked~ Censorious shears do not scare me nor do worldly stakes measure my beauty. Let the prime and proper roses preen in their curated beds. I am the sentence left untrimmed~ the wild ink bleeding through the margins, alive, stubborn, and creative where I was never meant to be.
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