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 memory . . .
a blown candle-
wick—black and crisp,
tastes of smoke-deep autumntime.
Wild turkeys ran beneath the trees;
blacktail deer lingered, clopped, crunched,
pivoted away from the cold squeal
of reds at the heel of a mama javelina
while the warm music of your hands
spread out wide,
your mouth buried in my neck
forever
taking the long way home.
© 2025 Jennifer Wagner
Note: “reds” are baby javelinas.
The lantanas are mostly deep green now—
only just a few daring red buds.
My quail chime, in turquoise and copper,
is silent and still.
There is solitary dancing, though,
at the hummingbird feeder—
a dark, flittering joy
against pale clouds
and amber glints of sunlight.
The patio couch pillows
in desert hues
are beginning to pop bright
in the growing light—
a soft place to land
near my potted sun parasol—
blossomless now. But I
remember them
from September
when the boys
brought it home to me
because you were gone.
Another hummingbird
pirouettes.
Now, in February,
you’re here.
And every day you drink me fully
with your eyes—a summer thirst
in winter, as if to make up
for autumn’s lost, lonely time.
And, I like this
all
just fine.
© 2025 Jennifer Wagner