When Her Roses Bloom
Rose petals floated in the dusty air.
A few landed at my feet as I sat weeping,
remembering the playful way she teased me
on the day she painted the old picket fence.
"It needs to be painted," she chided.
Fingers of a brisk March wind
brushed through her hair. All I could do
was stare at her beauty, the blush of cheeks
much more lovely then her roses.
"My climbing roses are much too pretty
to rest upon this dreary old faded fence,
but I can do it all by myself."
She smiled and plucked one of her pink roses,
tipped it in white wash and presented it to me
with the most graceful curtsey I'd ever seen.
That rose had been drying on the mantle
since that day, now brittle, gathering dust
and as hard as I tried not to touch,
when I held it, the petals fell, one by one.
She's been gone for too many years,
and through each one of them I've cried.
Today I white washed that fence again,
and when her roses come in to bloom
my heart will be consumed with the vision
of her smiling face and the gift of a rose,
white washed by her gentle hand.
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