Perennial

The night blooms.
Shadows follow
the red wane of sundown,

the air darkens, becomes saturated
with pollen. Still,
thoughts of you

invade he hollows
of my head.

When the moon is all too present against the panes,
I watch the garden waver –
I watch it fill with even more life, movement.

I watch the tulips’ stems bend,
their petals kiss the faces
of their neighbors, the irises –

the ones we planted in fall,
trying to outrun the frost.

I try to ignore the plot of asters
you made me agree to plant

after you were diagnosed.
Out of duty, an unshakeable
obligation, I tend them.

I tend them because, in my dreams,
you are the camellia’s scent – present,
though barely perceptible.

The Evening Stock begin to shrink inward
as light stretches the lines of their shadows.

Daytime insects stir –
they loop and circle
in the air above your garden.

You are in my memory, still, amid the off-white sheets –
there is light, the slow rhythm of your breathing,
and the heart monitor

chirping intermittently.