Flowers are like people, and flowers
can’t speak. Fires harm the flesh
but some greens rebirth. I think
about our love – it’s a zinger, lemon
on a wound. Does the hamper read
our pocketed angst with the lint?
(This poem can’t say.) The trails I hike
are littered with my sealed bottles,
you trace my hand with your lips;
together, we are bungalow of lies,
apart, we count birds we both know.
Lessons learned, aren’t people, only
their shadows. I fear words, too.