Ashley’s Poem
Michael Meyerhofer
There is almost no warmth in flowers,
the way they shrug off the topsoil
and have so little to say about the dark.
But the way you don't seem to mind
the long January walk from the bar,
the impossibly tangled strings
of your jacket, even the jagged shards
from the broken glass raised first
in honor of dead parents gives me
hope for whatever seeds remain
beneath this thick Iowa winter--
the tulips, the lemon-headed daisies,
the thirsty succulents that will rise
so effortlessly in just a few months,
their mouths in full-throated praise
of the way ice becomes rain,
how the sun seems to disappear
only to come back as petals of fire.
Michael Meyerhofer's fifth poetry book, Ragged Eden, was published by Glass Lyre Press. He has been the recipient of the James Wright Poetry Award, the Liam Rector First Book Award, the Brick Road Poetry Book Prize, and other honors. His work has appeared in many journals including Hayden's Ferry, Rattle, Brevity, Tupelo Quarterly, and Ploughshares. He is also the author of a fantasy series and the Poetry Editor of Atticus Review. For more information and an embarrassing childhood photo, visit www.troublewithhammers.com.