Daffodils

 
Fists balled in the hollow of the eyes
Sat in the old, creaky wicker chair
The scream stuck in the pharynx
Blue-overalls despair taking hold
Between the exhaustion and the chaos
The spirit, there, at odds, blooming,
Like a, like a, daffodil

The life springing from the rot
Always in need of a new pot
Always seems to thrive more
Than the one from the store
99p, bargain-of-the-day life
Just give it a poke with a knife
Not to, not to, daffodils

You care not for the ruin
You care not for the grime
As soon as you find yourself
Right on the edge of time
And running out of one
Second or minute, year or life
Time is, time is, daffodils

Then you blame all the gods
For forcing us to rely on strife
Forgetting the absolute beauty
Of a flower thriving on blights
Like a, like a, daffodils

Life is a songbird eating
The brain of a mouse
And you don’t get it, for
How could beauty do this
Eat seeds one day and the next brains
Survival dictates and hunger commands
Among the, among the, daffodils

Daffodils, it’s always daffodils they say
For lilacs are too sad and bitter for life
And hyacinths too sweet for death

Daffodils are the living, and the dead
The hot rot on a bed of mulch
The rising fruit and the fallen leaf
Green and yellow both the growth
Of moss and of mould
Of grief and of lief

The lines blurred until they burst

The body blooms and withers
Decays one season, feeds the next
Born to fester and feast

Prayers won’t get us there
But daffodils will, inevitably.

To Florence