Stand Closer

Orange and yellow lilies
Mixed with fuzzy brown grasses
Bend softly, ballerina style
Over the edge of the chipped clay pot.
Stand closer and you’ll smell them.

Hop-red double impatiens
Sport blooms
Pushing for attention
Against the green fichus wall.
Where rats play tag in the tangled branches.
Stand closer and you’ll hear them.

Don’t-you-love-it purple flowers
Survive
Next to the spreading snow-white alyssum.
I am the garden where they grow.
The rats are my sins.
Stand closer and you’ll see them.

© Kathryn Atkins
Fall 2004