As Mourning Doves Persist

photo Marcy Albin Morning glory spread to show this, her stamen, blanched. Finger tips lightly touch pink incisions. Anesthesia around the edges of waking fear of spotting. Breath creasing pillow halo with post op white spikes. Belly bloated as this trumpet of recovery. Name I recognize.

photo: Marcy Albin Pot of spent pollen prickly with armor. Darkens to honeycomb sap. Recoil petals curl. Fallow tubes and knife tongue meet. Small tools burrow in. This morning, upright. Plumped up. Anticipate touch. I will not concede. Look at me, all of me, what has sloughed off and is Never forgotten. Each seed a center. Bite of butterscotch and fire. Readied for the fight.

Exactly one month ago today I had a full-on hysterectomy as a result of the discovery of very early stage endometrial cancer. The ample support that I received from family and friends arrived with quirky, loving, and tender care  - prayer candles lit on an Hawaiian island. One Mormon friend fasting. Baptists in Texas doing what, I'm not sure exactly.    Among the myriad and personalized gifts that arrived were cell phone snapshots sent daily by a friend whose photos I have long admired. Thus, I became the recipient of a literal (virtual) flower a day.  Post surgery and back on my feet, so to speak. I've set myself an intention to pen haiku (or whatever marginally resembles same) to accompany each individual stem.  I begin: photo: Marcy Albin (for Bob and Delaney) If you peek into the center of pale withdrawn. You will spot the dew  there. Tentative as fear. One day to surgery  and puckered charcoal eye readies to be ...

What if the finches drop straight down through the branches like perky, agile acrobats? Such cat burglars. What if that duet of invasive squirrels stop when they spot me watching them trying to move in, and run back into their hiding place behind the folding screen on the porch where my daughter’s photograph is plastered larger than life and she’s wearing the christening gown that we all wore. Five generations of holy water. What if the sound in the night of a stainless steel serving tray tumbling to the cement wakes us? We will know that the rascals are at it again tipping to raid the seed bin, and the birds will need to make more noise to hold on to their sky climbing stick country. The tree’s arms scratching the roof for as long as I can remember. My daughter frightened by the sound in her bedroom as the natural movement carves the dark.

for eb Camera slung at the shoulder and a ledger of bikes that lean, yours is a chronicle of agave. Spines holding water. I would recognize you in the dark. The white spines of diaries, evenly matched on your shelves. Your whole  heart beats her wings. You are witness. You are prayer. Your home is your ribcage. Is a garden of surprises where morning  glories mix with your black Spanish hair.  Through the grass comes the sound  of your laughter. You spill before saints  and apostles. We stand ready to listen.

The yard is swathed in blossoms. Ornamental plum come full circle, its leaves like paper revisions discarded to this season with pale burgundy droplets falling. As if to sound breath’s arterial thread through the body’s old canals. This honey powder hint. Responsive in breeze. Transparent feeder empty against the tree where holiday lights remain in sunlight. Spark of what comes next.   Crab apple or apricot. Promise of patient daughter. Her pockets.     Yet as I watch this morning there is no one out there and no picking yet except to spy the subtler pigments – pink and white and hint of tan peering from the tips of tributaries. One branch you’ve tied together at a bend as if we know something of grafting. Or, simply, set out to repair what’s gone absent with brittle memory.