Petal Tenderness

photo by Xill Fessenden

This world has loved me.
I have walked enflowered,
petals swirling up from my footsteps,
little jacaranda flames licking the air
in countless tickling gifts of beauty.
This world has loved me enough
to rub me down to new skin
so many times, and always
bring me back to petal tenderness.

Since I was small this world has loved me,
calling me to look at the sky,
to be silent, to see.
Now I’m a woman who’s old,
here at the look-back at last.
In the time of my life that’s petal-light,
the blossoms of beauty multiply.
Every single day I love her back,
this world that loves me.

            ©Susa Silvermarie 2023

(Ekphrastic: poem on a work of visual art. Caminata con Jacarandas by Xill Fessenden appears in the book, A La Puerta de los Sentidos, published Ajijic 2021)