Bloom

I planted
a Peace Rose
twenty years ago.

Possums
and kangaroos
eat it nightly.
Never pruned,
or dead headed,
hardly watered,
mostly neglected;
sometimes
wrens sit on it.
Rainbow
Bee-eaters
snatch insects
sucking the life
from its flowers.
This bush graces my
barren backyard.
Roses,
pink
and yellow
roses,
budding,
blooming,
dropping petals.

All my photos of my own Peace Rose in the back garden.

It’s a survivor,
this plant,
this perfect
floral icon.
If only I
could
bloom on
rough ground,
and thrive where
I was planted;
I would be a rose
in a thorny world
laying down Peace.