In the depths of winter, I finally learned that
within me there lay an invincible summer.
– Albert Camus
Saturday morning
and not one bird makes a sound.
They’re watching me
cut each gladiola down,
keeping silent in respect
for my grief over orange,
purple, white, and mottled pink.
Until next year, I relegate
each stalk to recycling.
I’m enamored with intensities
that startle and invigorate
before they slip away:
day lilies, four o’clocks,
Rose-of-Sharon trees,
lovers on rebound,
lightning strikes of poetry.
Still, around the yard –
patient and long-lived –
hostas, daisies, and geraniums
ride the summer out.
They’ll hang on until
first frost – if affection’s paid.
Just as the lid drops on
what has been, empathetic birds
turn their muteness off.
They remind me
when summer is invincible,
there’s no mystery in falling,
falling in love again.
(Previously published in The Poeming Pigeon: Poems from the Garden, May 2017)
