it smells grassy and wet, sweet and mellow,
and our fingers are dusty yellow with dandelion pollen,
pockets full and palms full
and plans to make honey
without the aid of the bee.
but we will pluck our flowers and
soak our flowers and
strain our flowers and
boil our flowers
(the bee is gentler,
the bee is slower
and possibly less frantically giddy
about her own process
which she was made to do -
but we are only made to pick flowers
and find excitement in trying new things.
and what new thing does a bee do?)
dusty haze over the rays from a weary sun,
the life spores of a million trees and flowers
and fruiting things
tickling our nose and eyes, bringing tears,
oh this intermingling beauty and pain.
pain in the ass, pain in our bones,
pain with impending rainshower
which we can feel, magically,
in our joints like witches,
our one invisible but very real power.
bare, naked trees, bony and wretched,
don fuchsia and white and pink frills,
like many old decrepit women,
gaunt but oddly decorated in pearls,
with painted red-blotched mouths,
and candied fingernails
and that is all;
winter remembering spring.
