Read Poem: MOONFLOWER, by Lucy Martin

I cried beneath the clouds. The sky cried too.
It wasn’t much. So I turned on the loose
cold tap again.

Then you roared, burning red right through my moors;

“Enough, go cloud your head.”

I stripped, left all my soaked clothes on the floor.
You yanked them out, tossed them toward the door.
Your hands caught hair. My skull found stones and dread.
Where could I go? This floodplain was our bed.

I begged for heat. You left me in the frost.
You called the dew I made decay and rot.
So I built dams, fled thunder, feared the light,
and curled into a moonflower by night.

You hated how my petals sought the air.
You crushed them under gravel, didn’t care.
Said you were parched. Then blamed me for no rain,
and left me cracked and reaching up in vain.

But still this moonflower blooms beneath her rain.