The Perennial Violet

There amid once pristine bottles now reflective shards Delicately rises a violet like a swollen purple eye Darkened all the more by the shade of a dented can Half-submerged and tilted like a mortar aimed at the alley exit A sliver of sunlight plays down one of the two walls Slinking across the broken red brick as if some predatory snake  While the can’s shadow so slowly twists this way and that It seems a time lapse study of a hunted rat with no place to hide The broken glass which up till now had merely flickered Suddenly all flash as the sliver of sunlight brakes free of the wall Scattering sunbeams about the alley like searchlights Anxiously calling attention to the single lowly violet The tilted can, no shadow now but a warped mirror Reflecting heat like hate so enveloping the delicate flower Waves of air distort the colored petals just enough That purple seems to collect at the edge of the violet like blood As if the wavering form above were too heavy The stem in its gradual decline evokes a ballerina’s dance Each slow degenerate turn eerily symbolic Beside the dented can its fall affecting that of a struck soldier A nebula among a field of glittering stars Shriveling atop the dirt while liquid is pulled from it like a soul Its mouldering form nurtures the soil of its gravesite As deeply buried tendrils gather to await yet one more season Written October 10th, 2001 © on Oct 10 2001 11:41 AM PST, William Kenneth Keller   0 • 10