it was just a flower.
not even a blooming one.
it was dried up, and it was withered.
it was discolored. perhaps once it had been
pink or white or yellow.
but now if you were to try to describe it
you'd have to say it looked something similar
to stale, cold old tea, left out in the rain.
it was just an old flower.
but it was a flower
that caught my eye.
it was standing a little above
all the others in the bouquet.
like, even though she was far too old
she was hoping, just hoping, to catch
a whift of a beautiful summer wind
in her wildest dreams
even be carried away in his arms
another meadow, another summer
another life.
but of course
it had long been trapped in a foggy vase
never ever to breath that again.
someone took that away from her.
and as i came closer to her
i realized
just how very young
she had been.
petals
so soft and delicate
untouched
underneath the wrinkled skin.
i could imagine how she must have blossomed
before she was broken.
how she must have danced before
someone came along and snapped
her long, slender leg.
how she must have stood on point so tall
a little above all the others
laughing
her graceful arms twirling to the wind's
deep, passionate song.
and, i wondered, how she felt when she realized
as she fell limp in a stronger one's hand
that her beauty
had betrayed her
if she thought to herself
she should have hidden it, amongst the tall grass.
and if
as she gasped her last when the door closed out her world
if she tried to warn her sisters
"though the world knows us for our beauty
don't let them know your own"
"for it is all you have
and all i had"
i wonder how she felt when her agile limbs
fell weak and damp.
when someone touched every inch of her
helpless, sweet innocence
and smelled away her sweet perfume
for his own immediate pleasure.
on a whim, without thought he'd done this
because her beauty had pleased his eye
her youth, her blooming charm.
and with that, with one touch
ended that for her forever.
dunked in cold water in a hard, glass cup
and placed in the center of a dark table
her dying beauty for all eyes to watch.
when her lover, the wind's song, was beat out of her chest
by the suffocating cloud of indoors.
then how she felt when she was spilled and forgotten
eventually noticed and tossed amongst all the others
who'd lived and died just as her.
sad, hanging heads. she stood a little taller.
the second half of the last note she ever sang
still inside her.
one petal
cracked but facing the sky
as if she was caught mid-dance.
her face
still longing to feel the wind.
her beauty blossoming in a new way
from broken pieces had formed
knowledge
regret
wisdom
humility.
her tears had fallen for lost love
injured dance and quieted song.
her heart had angered for the selfishness
of the hand who'd took what was her's.
but now her life
spoke the words of the world.
her story
tells us the way of humanity.
and her death warns us
of how we shall choose to live.
by my sister Ryn
