The Savant of Sunflowers, The Apprentice of Roses (Diane Ackerman)

Something in a rose
knows to spread its roots
into a stable base,
how to shimmy up a trellis,
graft onto reliable stock,
open rich with scent,
and slowly unfold another
flush of tawny bloom.

While you’re away,
I miss the parts of me
that regrow with you:

the mischief elf, the sensual self,
the sonneteering ghost
who rides the flanks of night,
breathing time, sweating stars,
while memories swim
like constellations overhead.

I miss the serpentine Eve
who rarely doses, the attaché
that sometimes imposes,
all the sprites who sprint
through the high supposes,
the patient saint who aspires
to a heaven which encloses,
and, especially, the touched one
committed to the asylum
and penitentiary of roses.