flower poetry

" Artificial flowers! Petunias, these are, and violets,probably. Weeks pass, and they don't fade. I wait for them to droop as in a natural cycle. But they are stubbornly unalive and therefor unwilting, so they must be plastic, with machine- made blues and yellows and whites. Imagine that:plastic-flower sorrow." - C. Baxter-

Variation, Manipulation

She belongs to
a family with hundreds of
species just like her

they exist as:
flowering trees
magnolias
daisies
they are ornamental.
they manipulate
they know how to
engage, disengage
petals, sepals
reach out their
hungry arms.
They fascinate the eyes.
He belongs to a family with thousands of species
just like him
they breathe the same air
they are:
grasses
palms
lilies
onions
bananas
orchids
His leaves are narrow
and long
His veins run next to each other
in parallel paths
They are two lines that never meet.
They run lengthwise.
Her roots are normally woody.
They absorb the nutrients.

They make the connection.