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Lily of the Valley

at the end

of the day

she appeared

with a black box

of dirt

and inside the dirt

there were rows of roots

bearing

green leaves

she had been quietly

tending the soil

for two months

time

growing these roots

into leaves

and when i looked down

into the box

of dirt

with green leaves

i was stunned …

i looked at her

and looked down at the leaves

and looked back at her

i knew what she had brought me

she knew what she had brought me

this wasn’t just a box of dirt

and leaves

this was a memory

from long ago

that i had shared with her

when she was

a little girl

telling her how

when i was

a little girl

just her age

my favorite flower was

a tiny white bell

that smelled like the most beautiful perfume

in the world

and that nobody can bottle it

i told her how i’d never forgotten

what it smelled like

and how i hoped one day

she would find the flower

and breathe it in

i tried three times

to find it

once a nursery promised

they could order it

but after checking back

a time or two

it was not to be

another time a florist had my hopes up

convinced they had the flower

in stock

but it turned out

not to be

my flower

but something called

Leucojum

and from a distance

it looks the same

with its tiny white bells

but closeup

the green dots at the bottom of the bells

ring wrong

and the missing perfume

is a dead giveaway

another time

i found some bulbs at a big box store

and potted them straight away

and watered ‘em and waited

and waited

and waited

but the bells

did not appear

my daughter was 3

when she first asked me

what my favorite flower was

now she’s 18

out on her own

but she came back

in the middle of March

with a black box

of dirt

bearing green leaves

that may or may not

sprout into tiny white bells

of perfume

and while it would be wonderful

if they did

just knowing

she didn’t forget …

how she’s been

sitting in a horticulture class

in college

learning all about soil

and how to treat it

to grow whatever it is

you wanna grow

so when she saw the bulbs

in a big box store

two months ago

she bought ‘em straight away

and found a black box

and a bag of soil

armed with the knowledge

of what the soil needs …

it was hard for her to leave home

it was hard to watch her go

it’s been hard ever since

but last night

my 3-year-old daughter

came back

home

to surprise me

she did not forget ….

TL

Published inPoetry