Alas, the deer do really like the glads.
These are all stubs now after the two does with twins
and the single mother came hungry in the night.

We were allowed to cut a few fronds
before the conversion to venison.

The marigolds stand sentry,
repelling some classes of pests, or so the story goes.

Just pretty in the late afternoon.

Probably there’s no discussion between these two,
just a leaf rolled up and over,
unless it is a snake disguised in molt.

These guys bloom upside down
and close their petals in seeming modesty
most of the hours of the day.

The cosmos bloomed over the tomatoes in gay abandon.
They’re not, apparently, on the approved cervid menu,
unlike nearly everything else.
It isn’t likely the fence offers them much protection.

The pines would mark the middle of a forest of pines
if all the seeds on all the cones struck dirt
and weren’t mowed down and weren’t pushed back
by the equally eager advancing clusters
of locusts, poplars, maples, and oaks.

If flowers were subject to tavern regulations
these petals would snap shut and this stumble bee
be forbidden from loading more pollen.

When they grow beyond supporting ties
and their own strength,
the snapped-off heads may live again,
for a day, as a table bouquet.

Afterwords, with all the ret, they’ll settle
on top of the dead-head heap.

Journey’s end for all the worn blossoms;
many stages yet to pass
in the transition back into the soil
they sprang from,
but their last transits as discrete entities.
Entropy moves in for the easy win
as all the structures degrade and simplify
until an accidental or an intended seed
blows up through the detritus
and declares life’s victory in a fresh year.

Tags: blossoms, deadheads, deer, flowers, seeds, summer end