Wild Sweet Peas
Wild Sweet Peas
Growing in tangled thickets
all along the edges
you do not beg for water from the hose,
making due with the scant moisture
you find hidden within the earth
or with nothing at all
until your pods turn the color
of a golden August day,
dried and cracked open
after months of waiting,
sending your seeds
out onto the patient ground,
in preparation for the next year’s
free and ravelled arrangement
I remember you, your sweet scent
in summer sunlight
when I was no taller
than you tallest tendril
and I recall your tenacious vines
that wound through roadside ditches,
across forgotten fields
and snuck quietly, left alone
behind abandoned homes
Few care for you on purpose
but you don’t mind
you carry on with the
deep driven melody of summer,
season after season
first bloom after last bloom
childhood after childhood
asking nothing, offering everything
to whomever passes by
even after all these years of my absence
you thrive here,
behind this home in the woods
I’ve loved for so long,
but no longer live in
this home of so many past selves,
all of them younger, all of them still with me,
all of them still crawling over and through you,
and your reaching, twisting, curious vines.
And I know you still
by the vision of your wild pink and white perennials
growing verdant in the places so few people
take time to notice
I see you here today.
I know you old friend,
and I haven’t forgotten about you
and I will keep you with me as I leave,
to travel so very far from home,
Growing in tangled thickets
all along the edges
What did you connect with in this poem? What flowers or plants do you most connect with?
Share your thoughts in the comment section below or send me an email with artwork, poetry, photos, etc at wes@livethecuriouslife.com
