Perennial

It can be like this. One day

to wake up thinking goldenrod. Coneflower.

Not as suggestions, but directives.

So that you load the children in the car

and go. And it can be

that you hold a trowel

in your hand, your thighs scuffed

with dirt and manure, your face

likewise streaked, when you see,

for the first time in years,

someone you once loved.

It is then you wonder

what would have happened

if you rose from bed thinking: tiger

           or lily. Or if

you had stayed

that one night long ago.

But you are here.

And for a moment, you follow

that staircase again, open the old

apartment door. Stand in the bedroom

on that familiar, uneven floor

with a trowel in your hand, a hole at your feet,

and your daughter, eyes bright like daisies,

asking what you saw.