Wishes And Rose Petals
by J B Mulligan


A compost of wishes and rose petals -
sea monsters rampaging the garden -
the forbidden thing occurs,

wind and echoes blast across
the devastated landscape of tomorrows.
Two dead children:

the excited car, the innocent evening
knotted around a pole
where the curve fell away from earth.

"A gift for seventeen years...."
The numb acceptance of the stricken womb
rendered, after such brief joy,

infertile. The mind is a cave
of scattered gemstone memories
and hollow space

where the absent days
shriek and flutter in tall dark,
sharp-snouted and half blind

creatures any parent knows.
And we, in our honest, empathetic terror,
are ashamed of our relief,

the unearned pardon from
the black and empty robes of chance,
the random gavel's threat.






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