My skeleton dogwood gracefully clasped
the ensnared, helium-filled intentions.
It was mid-February, post-fourteenth.
(I have always grown older in winter.)
Still, such a fertile gesture was misplaced.
But my natural instinct to ignore
could not fight the innocence inside me—
sub-consciousness that lives to make wishes,
to pluck dandelions; blow them to bits;
the urge to deeply inhale antique books.
So I paused; turned around to see.
Right on cue the earth started to exhale,
a careful breeze like reincarnation.
Shiny, sweet nothing possessed by a dream
had no string to ground its metallic skin—
tied fear of loss that perverted freedom.
And as red and silver danced through dogwoods,
its far-fetched reassurance became clear:
“I LOVE YOU”—small hearts around smaller hearts,
circled like creepy circus carousels.
One hundred emotional projections
to define one hundredth of a second:
the cruel infinite imagination.
Before I could answer my own question—
the weightless sentiment’s grand finale
followed its fickle path, naturally,
impossible to catch—more so, to keep.
Swamps to Mountains 