Manuela Cardiga - Guilty Pleasures and Culinary Treasures

PLUCKING ROSES

Glorious, gloire, gloria
So many words for euphoria
All curling the same
Way on the tongue
Spilling the same air
From the fluttering lung-
All holding the very sway
Tremulous with the same ambition
The same avid decision:

So do we grasp the Rose
By any other name?
And is our reaching out
The same?
Do I stretch out wincing
Fingers to the stem
Or boldly grasp careless
Of the thorns or pain?

Oh but I think
I'll do the unexpected
Reach in to the bed of petals
And plunge my fingers
Into the moist
Tightly furled core
Rip out what I need
Ask for no more.

So Rose beware:
Even as you carelessly
Spill seduction in the air,
Count not on your thorns
To win this fight:
You will spill no blood
From me this night.

I take your inviolate heart
Coiled veiled velvet fire
That not-so-pure desire,
I bite, devour, tear it apart.

Glorious, gloire, gloria
So very many words for this one euphoria...

Manuela Cardiga