The Roses by Janice Krasselt Tatter
(for Karin)
It was my first birthday gift to her--
twelve Taj Mahal deep-red roses. I bought them
at Kroger beside pineapples, tomatoes
on the vine. She cut them underwater
at an angle, filled the cobalt blue vase
with plant food, water. They were
as lovely and elegant as a crystal chandelier,
and she set them in the dining room.
On day seven she moved them
to the mahogany dresser in our bedroom,
and each night as she filled the vase
with tepid water, I’d watch her smile
before she’d close her eyes, then lower
her face to smell them rose by rose.
She placed them in the living room
on the twelfth day. We expected
to be picking up petals, rearranging
stale, wilting flowers
but almost as if were characters
in a romance novel, our lives suspended
in fiction, the roses had opened even more,
fanning out in mouths of loveliness.
It was my first birthday gift to her--
twelve Taj Mahal deep-red roses. I bought them
at Kroger beside pineapples, tomatoes
on the vine. She cut them underwater
at an angle, filled the cobalt blue vase
with plant food, water. They were
as lovely and elegant as a crystal chandelier,
and she set them in the dining room.
On day seven she moved them
to the mahogany dresser in our bedroom,
and each night as she filled the vase
with tepid water, I’d watch her smile
before she’d close her eyes, then lower
her face to smell them rose by rose.
She placed them in the living room
on the twelfth day. We expected
to be picking up petals, rearranging
stale, wilting flowers
but almost as if were characters
in a romance novel, our lives suspended
in fiction, the roses had opened even more,
fanning out in mouths of loveliness.