Do you remember the purple crocus,
how he threatened to tear the petals
from his own sepal? I loved that fucking
wildflower, how he stood with his yellow
pistil in hand wanting to bloom all over again,
how the wind proselytized reincarnation
because to blow away as the Earth spins,
as pressures high & low squeeze your petals,
your stems—well, there’s just no justice
in that demise, to end on such a gusty whim.
That fear unfolds within me like a field
of violet spring: a petalless stem all out
of bloom, the gunshot on the prairie, spirit
drifting over the meadow like a hollow echo:
another qween boy collapsed on a bed
of wildflowers, waiting to rise.