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TO SLEEP– PERHAPS TO DREAM

March 21, 2024

One spring, the irises in my backyard didn’t grow. I looked out every morning, hoping to see the little green shoots, but it turned to summer, and then to fall, and there were no irises. I cried (because they weren’t only flowers– they were memories, and they were my childhood), but, with days and distractions, moved on. The next spring, with the smell of lilacs in the air and the soft sunlight like the face of a pansy, I was reminded again of the irises. ‘And perhaps’, I thought, ‘the bulbs were asleep and dreaming last year, and they’ll wake again this year.’ But they slept on. And on, through three years, until one spring, a spring of great loss and sadness, they raised their heads again.