Butterfly Bush

Finding it was such a roadside coup;

“have spade will travel” being my summer motto.

There on the packed, nearly barren earth

of the soon-to-be parking lot, fragile tendrils of rich purple.

How I blessed the bird that dropped that seed!

Now I walk the yard checking on the over-wintered;

an anxious time, before the new green shoots flag

my gloomy worries to a halt.

It seems a blighted stick, festoons of fossil flowers

droop to find their colors in the soil.

Too early to declare a loss, and uproot;

not to early for the shadow of grief to creep

across my hope.

All the winter long

my heart has seemed all scar.

Maybe it’s died back only to the ground,

leaving some bright life poised

to surge up from the root.