Flare

South of Arizona 86, we slow at a sudden
field of gold-poppies and dappled bladderpod.

Already their heads are closing—already the dark
cape of desert sky calls them home.

How like that roadside gouache we are, I say:
born of the mad summer storms, rain-soaked

and rooted like ravens on the scarp's red slope.
And like the single white lily drinking

the last brushstroke of sunlight, you say, flaring
now to rise again next spring.

Copyright © 2008 Simmons B. Buntin All rights reserved
from Whiskey Island Magazine
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission