Malapropos, my slow mind & mouth

play cyclamen-chlamydia-Clytemnestra

like a musical scale. It embarrassed you

once when I only meant flowers,

only then meant something

of how things turn, on & against –

Tender is the morning

quiet, leaves gently

offering their shapes open

to small hands: hello. Here, gloss & flesh

sudden in the glass;

waves come through sails or sky;

the cat turns to gull or glimpse

of fox. The maiden a crone

like some plain punchline. I knew this

before I ever did.

Image: Gabrielle Ludlow / flickr