Freeway Haiku
Blast down blacktop tense and tired
Round shoulders of oleander
Ease my burden
ZOOM
EIGHT LANES OF HURTLING STEEL
DIVIDED BY PINK BLOSSOMS
CALIFORNIA FREEWAY
Oleander Blessing
Gentle, constant
bobbing
At the corner of my eye
Blossomed benediction
for each passing car.
Oleander
If you leave in winter
I will choose white oleander
From the branches lush and heavy near the gate
In a rain of snowy blossoms, I will gather strong green branches
and weave a wreath to hang, or take away.
If in the spring you go alone
Regrets in black ink left upon white paper
I'll cut the faintest pink star oleander,
the petals soft and glowing like small ears
and let their tender stems bleed pale for me.
But if in summer deep you leave me
standing, calling, keening,
Only deep, red blossoms
Crimson oleander
Will do to stuff the vases, strew the bed,
Fill coffee cans, buckets, and the claw-footed tub
Till the white walls blush
And petals lie like bloodspots on the floor.
Common
Hurtling past at 75
Too busy even to blink
I see oleander wave serenely from the median
Cloud white, lip pink, stopsign red
Their rosettes glow like soft tail lights
Clustered on green poles.
Look at us, they say
We're common as dirt
Potted in macadam, choked in fumes
Miles from the nearest sprinkler,
We flourish!
Why, we could leap these low walls in one bound
And roll right down the blacktop, fragrant tumbleweeds.
I see them lift their strong arms high
and hear the spinning tires sing out their names:
Marrakesh
Turner's Flirt
Mary Constance
Ruby Lace
Sister Agnes
Scarlet Beauty
Pleasant's Post Office Pink
Rose of Jericho, Galveston's Pride
How bad can this world really be
When beauty like yours grows for free
On every highway, parking lot and schoolyard in the state?
Common as sin
thick as thieves
your white points numbered as the stars?
Kelly Peinado, copyright 2000
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