A Field of Snapdragons by John Grey

My wife and I have been walking

through the woods, We’re tired.

Pale lavender and blue flowers

invite us to take a seat.

The car is parked a mile away.

We can’t see anything from here.

Not her Irish family.

Not my third shift job.

And these blooms are not just

for admiring from a distance.

Petals, axils, downy leaves,

are made for immersion.

Sure, we’re giants to them

but I sense no fear,

hear no complaints.

The ones our bodies crush

will be replaced tenfold

when we leave.

How peaceful it is.

How forgiven we feel.

Not just for recent sins,

but going back through our entire lives,

cleansing, clearing up, mollifying, even erasing.

And how transporting

is stillness in a quiet place.

To be in one gorgeous pasture

is to be in every exquisite land

we can imagine.

When it’s time to go,

we brush the green, the seeds, the petals,

lightly from ourselves.

But that amounts to so little of this place.

I don’t blame the hands.

They can only do so much.

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John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident. Recently published in Soundings East, Dalhousie Review and Qwerty with work upcoming in West Trade Review, Willard and Maple and Connecticut River Review.