Page 30 - WTP Vol. VI #4

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as I might inhale your spicy fragrance; may I recall in winter
the murmur of your petals whispering on the summer wind.
Hydrangea
These deciduous plants adorn
the lawns on which they lavish panicles,
large white flowerheads, growing among spear-shaped evergreen leaves.
The bushes are as showy as their flowers that are often thought
to resemble pom-poms.
Every spring and summer, I observe
their enormous blossoms bob among their greenery as if noticing
someone one hasn’t seen for however long and whose name is momentarily gone,
as I forget their names every season. The flowers bloom steadily through
midsummer into August lushness, then begin their pink
blush in the late summer coolness among the first harbingers
of the frosts of autumn.
Each year the flowers are dried and sold
on roadside stands to celebrate the turning of the great wheel of summer.
And each year I finally remember, then forget until next season, when the hydrangea
bloom so whitely, while my memory slips away ever so much from year to year, until
it maybe lapses entirely:
Hydrangea, may I remember your name,
Wally sWist