I’ll tell you why

it flowers at 5am
that seed you planted the night before
as you sleep its roots curl round the crevices of your brain

folded in good and tight

I’ll tell you why

its smell is in your stomach
settled like a fog you can’t breathe out
so you spray it with the perfume of a weathered promise

deodorant of shame

I’ll tell you why

the bloom unspilled but trembling
ripens in the breeze between your days
scatter in imagined gaze of imagined someone else

light breath on the mirror

I’ll tell you why