October Lily

October Lily

Oh, lily, can you tell my why

You’re blooming by the fence?

To blossom in October seems

To challenge common sense. 

Your sibling lilies, summer born,

With summer’s death complied.

They opened hopefully in June,

Then decorously died.

I know they have not really died—

They’ll rise again next year,

Providing floral counterpoint

When birds again appear.

We all, I know, would love to live

Beyond our passing prime—

Defying all the sense and sway

Of autocratic Time.

And so although I’m puzzled by

Your fall audacity,

I touch your fragile blossom with

A hope that touches me. 

The gross enfant terrible cursed.

His language was among the worst

I've heard. I punched. And now he’s nursed

By one who wished she’d punched him first. 

Shakespeare Couplet:  Romeo and Juliet (12)

“Go, girl, seek happy nights to happy days”—

So says the Nurse, a wishful, hopeless phrase. (1.3)