one must leave the garden
of earthly delights
where it belongs in a chest
or dresser drawer
the true Beulah is more ordinary
swaying on its stalk
lure and haven for a host
of nectar-seekers
blooming quick as thought
before the trees sprout new shadows
shaped like gaywings bellwort
mayflower windflower
thin as a spindle
in the fat of the land
or massive as an old red oak
encircled by bear corn
supplicants turned parasitic
must leave their own leaves behind
diminutive towers flowering
out of the ground
till the corollas lose
their erections
and the teeth of the calyx
turn brown and drop
what would you give up
for a life of ease
the garden of earthly delights
slithers on its belly
quieting the cries of nestlings
one by one
it lives as angels do
only in the moment of contact
upside-down and electric
from a thundercloud’s dark soil
a devastating epiphany
heartwood preserved in charcoal form
as the oak grows its hollow
for wilder life
