"I killed a flower for you, the other day
it was a magnolia
and its only crime was its beauty"
I say to her as I put the flowers on the bed of her grave

"and it got me wondering if beauty was the reason you got plucked so early in the seasons
did the gods fear the summer would be too harsh for your delicate petals?
or the winter brutal on your roots?"

I pull a single dandelion that's peaking though the concrete by my side
and I add it to the bouquet of the other flowers I've killed to make her shrine

" oh don't you worry it would've just ended up a yellow smudge under someone's shoes
you see, it grew in a crack in the pavement
a by-walker would've stepped on it by accident

and it got me wondering again if your beauty was the reason for your absence
if your fairness was what made the gods deem this world unfit to host your essence ,
if it's ,indeed, the light in you that made them go to such lengths
can the gods be kind and make just one thing clear?
what does it say about me that after all these years I'm still here?"

© Ma-cal