Madelyn E. Camrud

 

That summer of good rains, 

he scattered seed for her—the woman 

he loved; she his life, disease he wasn’t ready for; 

nor was she, young by standards today; 

brilliant; beautiful; loved before

she left; loved still and ever 

after because that’s how it is with flowers, 

tall and slender, growing below 

a mountain where breezes fall; where 

bears romped, rolled on seeds—

the hundreds of pounds he planted; 

stalks grown tall after good rains as if the love 

would not go away; as if all and every 

love is a story; yet never one so rare 

as The Cosmos; none so delicate, and true.