Domicilium Floralis
I want to weave wildflowers through all the broken spaces;
Twist their stems around the gaps of lattice.
Let vines become neighbor to cracked and peeling paint,
With a carpet of soft petals
Beneath paneless windows
Framed with bright blues and vibrant violets,
Crimson and gold and magenta.
Not to conceal the ugly, the imperfect
But to see life flourish in the most unexpected of places.
Let them take root,
Grab hold of every scarred surface,
Intertwined with the infrastructure.
I will watch them as they bud, then bloom,
Bursting with cacophonous color,
Raucously alive.
This piece is significant to me for two reasons. I love the idea of nature supplanting what humans have created, enduring longer and more stubbornly than all our hands have wrought. And, as metaphor, I love the idea of beauty and life redeeming that which is ugly and broken, remaking it into something altogether new. Somewhere in the world there must be a rotting building, utterly dilapidated and unsound, overrun with multitudinous varieties of flora.
Angie Anthony