Lavender

Some words spill beauty well

beyond a dictionary.

Not lav-end-‘er.  Too

bodily and finally, abruptly

some-thing, to enchant.

But scent in sachets.

There’s a word whose sibilance

and sliding sensuality evokes

the world of southern belles

who laughed their way through

pillared mansions white!

And muslin envelopes with ribbon tied

below the question mark, above

the bracket of a silken hanger padded

soft. 

            An object I remember vividly

though not

                       in time or place

but is

with that vague scratch of scent

made into waves of blue by finger crush –

for lavender is always blue

for me, dilly, dilly, and surely,

comforting, maternity. 

My thinking back demands

acceptance of the cost of

lost: that which has gone. 

Is gone.