Worry-free Rose

Water spills from the birdbath

In a tsunami

That snaps a neck of my Worry-free(R) Rose

And lands two blossoms in a lake of mulch.

Drops of water collect on the petals

As if the stagnant birdbath water

Were drops of dew.

It is a beautiful death,

But it is not over.

Other blossoms from another neck

Crane and strain to reach the sun beyond the Rose of Sharon--

A greedy, weedy thing with vague pretensions of a religious past

That sucks up all the air and light around it--

It’s what happens when a Maker outsources story,

And the story becomes a brand--

But I was speaking of the Hydra,

Or, should I say, my Worry-free(R) Rose

In whose world water stands in for swords and fire,

This small garden, for Lake Lerna,

And me, for Hercules--

Oh, and these broken roses now perched in a vase, for myth.