I picked up a petal
from the window sill today
and it felt like
the softest thing in the world
I wondered from what tree
it came from
and if its fellow petals
were missing it
I felt through its velvet redness
and smelled, under my runny nose
the faint but terrible fragrance
of its memory
I wondered what the petal
thought of me
or the mild disease I had
as I fixed it into the iron pendant
of a borrowed necklace
There it stayed..for a while,
comfortable under my neck
I wore it happily,
as if I were a hunter,
proud of his game
Sometimes it would fly
as though I'd blown on it
from a sneeze
and when it hit the ground,
it would call me
With a whispered squeak
it cends my name into the air
until I pick it up again
Then I understood
that the petal was not an it.
It wasn't a thing after all
It was alive,
or still alive
and it had a name,
one of a boy's,
the petal was a he.
He was a child.
And as soon as I realized
these few facts,
he flew once again
away from the cold metal
away from my breath
I looked for him,
not hearing the lightest sound
from the grey cement floor
or the cold anticipating air
he wasn't there,
I couldn't find him
and when I looked up
everything was red.
