This was my father’s garden, too many years ago to count and yet,
the memory of it is as sharp as if I had seen it yesterday. My father
loved carnations. Carnations and chrysanthemums, the great,
shaggy headed, curled-over petalled flowers, which were almost
glints of architecture in amongst the more gentle flowers.
THE SCENT OF CLOVES
The garden was full of carnations
Standing in elegant rows like delicate soldiers,
Or curling up together
In friendly circles,
Their silvery green leaves
Supporting each other.
That spicy sharpness of cloves,
That remembered scent of carnations
Filled the air,
Making me dream of other lives
Lived by fabulous people,
Which, one day, I would discover for myself.
But I never did.
For my own life elbowed those dreams
Out of the way
And gave me carnations.
©2019 Gwen Grant
Poems by Gwen Grant 