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So many colours to choose from, so why must they always be red roses?

In the restaurants, boutique shops, flower stalls, everywhere – red roses!

 

Gardeners call some of them tea roses, but it isn’t about tea, or love.

It’s all about size, and the fact that they have no scent, like dead roses.

 

Last year, we noticed two children at the airport, waiting for their luggage,

As their parents unpeeled candy to sweeten them – two pink well-fed roses!

 

Heaven uncoiled its garden hose this morning, an endless, thick, grey snake

Of dirty-white water, which flooded the backyard, giving us a row of wet roses.

 

Some time ago, I visited a friend, who found out her husband had another,

A much younger woman looking to harvest from another’s bed of roses.

 

Returning to what I’d like to think of – other colours, more detail and scent,

Wild bouquets of cornflowers and carnations, anything instead of roses.

 

*Please look online for the definition of a ghazal.  Thanks.

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