A Petal

3/16/11

A petal, soft between my thumb and palm

left here, a remnant of your bouquet

taken back with briefcases full of drug stores.

One bedside table now empty.

Checked the drawers and even Gideon's Bible is missing.

Did you really have to drive the nail home so deep?

As if the broken vase wasn't clear enough.

I have 10,000 crystal shards to peer through,

press my lips to,

pray the blood that runs leaves slower than you did,

tastes closer to truth than you did,

makes stains on a hotel carpet more permanent than the ones left back home

so that the next broken heart to check-in can hear my story

through faded dark fibers,

know he's not alone, and me?

I'll be hearing birds, fresh arrivals with spring,

sipping coffee from our patio,

taking in peace before I turn all these floors to hardwood.

I'll donate your shoes, bathrobe, and volumes of novels you pretended you'd read eventually.

The problem with "somedays" finally ringing clear.

And as for this petal, thought about keeping it

pressed between pages of a foreign language,

one brimming with metaphors of our shipwreck

but you know what?

It's not like you left it on purpose.

Why hold onto a thread when I needed the rope?

This splinter's a sliver of the gangplank I clung to and even that wasn't stable.

My hope that a flower will grow from this reminder defies biology,

new plants come from seeds.

So I'll toss it out the window on the long drive home

and although the shotgun's looking empty

at least I get to pick the playlist.

I always hated your music.

Seriously, that shit was awful.