The Traveler and the Rose
A strange blue rose - alone
midst an array of clustered flowers -
a few of them her friends -
the shy violets, lovely white lilies, and bold marigolds.
In the gracious garden spot the traveler singled her out -
his gaze resting admiringly upon her.
Each day as he passed that spot,
she was the one he sought. . .
And day by day the traveler came around,
speaking through the fence softly in sweet sounds
that wafted her way with the wind.
Persistent wasp, in guise of a honeybee,
he tried so hard to wear that flower down. . .
till unexpectedly, he strode right through the gate,
and blissfully ignorant of a rose's care,
plucked her up, swept her high up into the air,
and uprooted that blue rose from her safe soil.
But he did not a gardener make.
Knowing nothing of roses,
he knew very little of any flower he pursued.
Moreover, one mere blue rose cannot long compete
with the other bright fanciful flowers
which, along that traveler's path, he was sure to meet.
Those soft whispered words
that caressed her blossomed cheek
soon ceased.
And the water to her soul (if a rose has a soul,
he did not care to know), stopped its flow.
Scars he left -
new thorns on her stem that grew outward
from his cruel cut,
but she'd go on. . . .
Long time replanted now in solid refuge ground,
the strange blue rose
has gained self-understanding,
that one thing for himself (she imagines)
which the traveler she so briefly knew
has never found.
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