The Rose
You gave me a rose
last time we met.
I told myself
if it bloomed
our love would bloom,
& if it died-
O I did not
consider
the possibility.
It died.
Though I cut
the stem
on a slant
as my mother
taught me,
though I dropped
an aspirin
in the water,
it hung its head
like a spent cock
& died.
It stands
on my desk now-
straight green stalk,
blood-red clot
of bud
drooping
like a hanged man's
head.
Does this mean
we are doomed?
Does this mean
all lovers
are doomed?
O my love-
I have not read roses
as amulets
in seven years. . . .
Which doom
is worse?
To love
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poem by Erica Jong
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