flowers by elizabeth gibson

What can I possibly give you today?
Not much. Only a spray of flowers.
I’ll leave them by your door
and through your tears you’ll see
 
white lilies and lavender and baby’s breath,
scooped from a pond of mermaids.
There’ll be red flowers too: scarlet,
majestic, like blood staining tissue.
 
I'll wrap them simply so you’ll pick them up
and hold not fancy curls and foil
but just a sheath of flowers, like a child,
like a farmer holds wheat.
 
I'll write your name on a scrap
of parchment and drench it in dyes
of maroon and amber and saffron,
like the sunset we know is coming
 
and I’ll sprinkle it with nutmeg
and cinnamon and through your pain
and fury and harrowing loneliness
you’ll know you are loved.

✱✱✱

Elizabeth Gibson is British poet currently living in France. Her work has appeared in journals such as Far Off Places, London Journal of Fiction, Octavius, Severine and Ink, Sweat & Tears in the UK, and Sea Foam, Gigantic Sequins, Firefly Magazine, Germ Magazine and Rising Phoenix Review in the US. She tweets at @Grizonne and blogs at http://elizabethgibsonwriter.blogspot.co.uk. She edits Foxglove Journal.