Reflections of Flowers

A Thousand Cranes, Volume 10 by Ashlee Craft - Cover

From A Thousand Cranes, Volume 10

rhymes floating in floodgates of windows, Hey Jude is playing quietly in the background, Goodbye Yellow Brick Road too as she’s walking across the cement, the ground below her is absorbing the sound of footsteps, & they’re echoing between buildings / cool cement in the late afternoon, long shadows / she has decided what she is going to be & walking towards it, bags packed / uncertain future in the distance, like the sun, but she runs to greet it because it is the sun

words floating in empty buildings, they are totally silent but for the street traffic outside, horns honking & the quiet lull of motors, breathe in deeply the emptiness & realize that emptiness can become anything / this building is empty, but it is beautiful / think of the geode: a plain ordinary rock that only when it is broken reveals the quartz crystals that were inside of it all along; this is you / you think your brokenness makes you ugly, but being broken was the only thing that allowed you to see beauty that would have been otherwise hidden from you

raindrops floating in reflections of flowers, you sat inside while it was raining & watched the droplets falling, thinking that you were stuck inside while the storm raged / I said something to you about how everyone must learn not to be afraid of going out to get what they want / you looked me in the eyes & got up & opened the door, took a deep breath & stepped out into the rain / “I don’t have to let storms stop me!” you sobbed, smiling as you walked barefoot in the puddles, watching raindrops bounce off flower petals, & ran through the gardens as the storm raged outside, & I joined you / eventually the clouds parted; warm rain stopped falling & the sun returned from behind the clouds, warm sun in the humid air in lush dark green garden, & the flowers were still dancing

 

blackberry flowers

Blackberry Flowers - Ashlee Craft // ashleecraft.com

forgotten / I saw you standing off to the side

trying to pretend that you couldn’t see the sun / flowers
along the side of the trail, you walked so far ahead of me
I had to squint into the sun to see you / it was how you wanted it
to be; running away, like you always did / you stopped
& bent down to look at the flowers

I approached you slowly / a shadow from the trees above us
reflected down onto you, all I saw was your fragile & shatterable self
confidence was hanging by a thread & I felt a greater sense of pity
& a greater sense of nurturing towards you than I previously knew
then fear made sense to me / you were afraid of losing me to the wind & the storms
& yet I was afraid of losing you to the night & the words
of everyone who tried to bring you down

you sat there still & silent / looking towards the flowers
but not at them / “I’m sorry.” I told you
the breeze blew & the flowers trembled, then the breeze came to a close
& the sunlight fell still & rested upon the petals
“it’s all going to be okay.” I said gently to you “everything is going to be fine.”