Bitter, aber süß

by Lucinda Kempe

Soft rain patters onto the canvas umbrella. A pink button rose rescued from a forlorn spot of shade. Buttercup primroses pilfered from a yard in Queens.  Bee balm’s blooms, a gift from Wheaton cousin’s rootstock. The Octavia Street urn repossessed after the sale.  An iron candelabrum positioned near the Belgium blocks for style. Bricks laid by husband for a garden wall. Bluestone delineates the beds.  Cement bird bath steadies on the cesspool stone.  Evidenced in everything . . . .

Yet.

Gladly would I exchange this peat-filled plot for a glimpse of a long lost beau—pater.

* * * * *

Biography: Lucinda Kempe lives in an Arts & Craft style house where she exorcises with words. Her work has been published or is forthcoming in New World Writing, r.kv.r.y., the Summerset Review, the Journal of Compressed Creative Arts, and Corium. She received the Joseph Kelly Prize for creative writing and is an M.F.A. candidate in writing and creative literature at Stony Brook University. She was a semi-finalist in the Under the Gum Tree (telling stories without shame) 2016 inaugural contest.