My husband tells me I should write about life, about the garden
he’s planted: the celosia topped with felted flames, the chenille
full of muppets’ pink fingers. And it is not negligible, the life,
the marigolds crowding the touch-me-nots, the squash blossoms like nylon try-on socks stashed in a plant we did not mean to buy. If it must be life, let me also mention the cardinal. He is gargling
song at the top of a dogwood. Life, my husband tells me, an orb of waning geranium plucked and balled in his hand, and I, who have told many half-truths, say, But I always write about life.
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