The Day We Tried To Save The Roses (Final Version) Poem by Mary Angela Douglas

there should be perfume made from the grass pale green
after our Grandfather mows the lawn and we could
stopper it with the crystal blue of the sky above

the backyard and we picked rose petals from the
flower bed and smothered them in the linen closet
tightly wrapped in saran wrap
thinking they would become our very own rose

perfume till Grandmother said some moons later
what is this, little
girls? and filled with gloom we had to face the fact
we were never going to be perfumers and how come

everyone else's science experiments worked
but our rose petals turned brown and didnt seem
at all the way we remembered them
and yet and yet on rare days I remember the scent
of those roses the first scent the pink of it the red of

it the rose red stories we told ourselves
sure of a rose red resurrection
if we were careful
and I start to cry at the kindness of God
preserving it anyway so vividly,

like a plaster imprint just made today,
rose veined; that I take out

smoothing the linen of our minds
I remember the Day We Tried to Save
The Roses

beyond what could be expected of
anyone of our age or disposition
as if there were no past but only those
roses only that sky

still, and ever present
in our blossoming through Time

mary angela douglas 26 march 2015; 19 november 2023