Be sure to live in vain dear. I wish I had.
        Emily Dickinson

A birthday comes but once a year.
Today— mine brings the zinnia’s first bouquet:
Queen lime red, Sahara cherry,
salmon, and yellow flame.

Never true blues, yet who needs them
against an azure sky?
And though clouds blur this morning,
they embrace the heavens still. 

I blow a kiss to Mother Earth—
the one who whispered to Emily D
to live in wonder, as I do here,
in dirt and nature.
The rest is passing mist.