She keeps her roses in my kitchen,
to avoid the prairie sun
that wilts their blooms
and makes old women of their skins,
before the nooning of the day.

She spreads her straw upon my ground,
and adds in mysteries and proverbs
of the earth, and sun, and wind,
to visit moisture on her lips
with springing rains.

She breathes and fills my rooms
with sparkled air and life
she grew from trees and reeds
of green down by her riverbank.

She hangs her tools within the darkness
of my shed to keep the rust from
growing bloodlike on their sheen,
no tarnish seen in eyes of rumple night
or far bright day in light on her horizon.

She keeps her roses in my kitchen,
by my bed above her head,
in the hallway by the mirror,
on every second Tuesday when
the robins dance with crows
to wake the sun.

09/10/1997

Posted on 03/07/2005
Copyright © 2025 Timothy Somers