Elizabeth's rose lies dusty and crinkled
on some ceramic jars in the kitchen.
There it remains, four years running.
Surprisingly, mother keeps it
Though it is flaking apart
and just a tinge moldy.
No one has the heart to discard it.
"Beloved Elizabeth..."
I remember while gingerly examining
her lonely remnant,
Preservation as I misted it in sticky
nostalgia.
Its stem is brittle, emaciated-
The vitality of the bush a distant thought.
Funerary tears drip solemnly
down the petals, enriched in bittersweet,
mourning memories.
I wish the woman were more defined for me:
Her touch, her smell absent from me
save for one innocent rose
plucked from her coffin,
dried, sprayed, left
quite utterly unnoticeable.
Yet surviving in plain sight
refusing to be forgotten.