flowers

flowers 

flowers are left to die 

flowers are cut and taken, why do we do this? 

cut the flowers and take away their breathing 

leave their roots in the ground so that they may provide for You again. 

moisture froths at the mouth of the stem 

You’ll have to wash Your kitchen shears 

With faucet water, sink their quiet tears

With indifference, chain them to their bad choices:

Offered no choice but the choice to trust You

You’ll start to smell them rotting a few days after You’ve taken their lives. Your nose will catch the stench of their struggle permeating Your home. 

Clear water in Your centerpiece vase will thicken with the brown blood of the slowly deceased.

Still, the flowers will cling to one fleeting life,

after You leave them sucking through open wounds a few more days of desperate survival from the water You won’t change for them. 

They choose to suffer, to tolerate their amputated bodies, to blister in their own waste. 

They’d like to stay clean and new and beautiful

for You.

To be worthy of the ovation your gracious eyes suggest

To give You everything they have,

They’d like to stay alive long enough to feel You 

take them in, 

to bloom in Your presence,

Oh, the way they yearn to savor this cheap exchange.

Over and over they will be tricked again. Fingers will entice them in dance and they’ll beam like they’ve never been touched before, as if to give permission of ownership.

As if to tell you that nobody has ever claimed them before. 

They will whisper to the grass about their new friend when You disappear into the garage. When You emerge with a hanging fist, Your garden secateurs concealed by Your palm, swaying in synchronized motion with the shifting hips that frame Your tip toe, they will be tricked again.  

They won’t see Your left hand swatting away the bees that raised them, and they won’t see your right hand reaching for their life.  

They will only see Your focused gaze, a quiet greed that, concealed behind Your eyelashes, they will confuse for endearment. And they won’t feel the pain. They will mistakeYour cautious arms wrapping around them in abduction as a careful embrace. 

They’ll be carried inside, between Your palms and turned towards Your face, so that they may remain still anchored to Your eyes, while pieces of their home loosen between Your fingers. The dirt that You’ll later dispose of— parts of the flower that You’ll melt away with hot water and Pine Sol. When You walk away from the vase, they will look down at themselves for the first time, unsure of why they feel so tired. Only that evening, when they’re moved from the table to behind a corner on the kitchen counter, will they listen to Your fork and knife dancing life onto Your dinner plate and realize that they’re dead. They’ll spend the rest of dinner with their eyes closed in an attempt to preserve their energy for when You lift them back up, so that You won’t notice the dull wilt that has already begun to warp their figure.  

They’ll think it’s their fault for not being able to hold Your favor when You eventually toss them in the trash. But they will continue to look up at You every time You stand mounted over them, burying them under food waste and paper towels. They’ll notice that You no longer look at them like they’re anything to be seen, now clothed in coffee grinds and spoiled cream. It is at this moment that they will look at you, and will definitively and irrevocably understand. And then, they will look down at themselves for the last time; 

Left to die alone