VERSE | THE ROSE

I looked in rapture at the rose 
As it waxed in the sun
A bold and brilliant orange 
In its emerald column

It was absolutely perfect! 
Its beauty was sublime 
There was little reason 
In the soil to bide its time

I felt a maddening urge
To pluck it off its stem
To put it in a vase
To covet that lovely gem

The sunset-coloured rose
Would glorify my room
The garden would do without
This one splendid bloom

The yen turned to despair
That rose I had to have 
And so the stem that held the bloom
Felt the force of my bare hands 

The break, it was not clean
Nor did it cleave in two
The stem that bore the rose
From the part that bore the roots 

The rose hung limply down now
Its head grazing the ground
Its petals seemed to fold in
As it moaned without a sound

I watched its resplendence 
Its spirit and its mirth
Flow out of it bit by bit
Back into mother earth

A lancing stab came tearing in
Somewhere around my heart
I had mauled and ravaged
Nature’s precious art

I can still see the rose 
As it lay waning in the sun
Like a little cut that never heals
The memory of it still thrums.