Shades of Color

recent garden news:
our tenth homegrown salad meal, 
lupines, lilies, love

Camp Moves

a rainy weekend
yet with my loving daughter
nothing was flooded

the most perfect park
the most perfect afternoon
marred by words, actions

my innocent girl
who only wanted this day
not a broken mom

but it's just a blur
one day bleeds into the next
watered with defeat

yoga, gardening:
life skills and English practice
midsummer dream

surrounded by blooms
(yet the reality kills)
as they slowly die

eighteen long months late,
we celebrate our friendship
of thirty short years

she survived COVID
now, we're both vaccinated
to celebrate love

what a perfect place
green grounds, infinity pool
for endless friendship

summer garden joys:
second of many salads
grown and cut by me

thank you for the “no.”
as phallic as this lupine
(allium ignored)

i will learn from this
(things i tell myself at night)
and grow a sagebrush

it will bloom purple
(you can’t see my true color)
and you can’t taste it

yet, here it blossoms
as beautiful as the home 
you constantly loathe

i know. i know. i…
you don’t see what i see. stop.
but god. how it hurts.

an eight-mile walk
through Colorado’s beauty
even before blooms

the mountains call us
with their peak views, quaking aspens
(listen for the call)