The First Peony

by James Crews

The First Peony   by James Crews

Soon, the rain-slicked bud will be
nothing more than a memory
for the plant, and for me, having
held it in my hand on this gray
May morning, when I looked out
and couldn’t resist stepping across
wet mulch and clover to get closer,
to touch the pink seam through which
petals were already pushing to become
something far more extravagant
than necessary—beauty as its own
excuse for being. Haven’t you too
felt the pull toward some brief
opulence, born not out of ignorance
of all the suffering in the world,
but full awareness of these limited,
time-bound bodies? Doesn’t it feel
like the opening of a wound 
the moment the first peony 
decides to bloom?