like winter sun warming the crisp outline
of evergreens on frost’s last kiss,
like an impression of stars
bursting in indigo nightframe,
like orion, swift-slaying, swaying
between boughs,
she is electric, blue-jazz summer sky,
ricocheting
with all the fierce beauty
of a flowering storm
© 2026 jennifer wagner
q44: flower
photo © jennifer wagner, from las noches de las luminarias, desert botanical garden, phoenix, az
This poem is about purple,
and teal,
and lemon meringue pie—
about sage green
and chicken, spatchcocked,
and grilled.
This poem is about wrapping myself
in a silk-slick black robe, disappearing into midnight,
being seen.
It’s about color—
and taste,
and smell,
and feel,
and things that just make sense
when they don’t.
Like when
and how quickly
we made ourselves one.
How it all could have been undone.
How we could have been
undone.
But contrast,
and tang,
and memory touch,
and savory savoring—
holding on
when it hurt so much—
saved us
from us.
© 2025 Jennifer Wagner