there's not a pain like
an opened peony
ephemerally twisting a knife
of how beautiful and limited your time is
in its flourescence.

the pain of
preparing yourself
for next May, same time,
as the flower, paper-petaled,
a delicacy,
will be rooted here after you're gone.

this legacy you won't leave,
with its ancestors of the ants crawling on its buds,
to which you resign to yourself,
to the peony, the ants,
'that is fine by me.'