David Filer

FOXGLOVE: DIGITALIS PURPUREA

Once only a gray-green mat, like the weeds
That have survived winter in the bare ground
Around the roses. Now some spark has set
Them off, their green rocket tips, gently bent
Like hemlocks, at five feet and growing
Still, trailing plumes of blossoms, white like
Snow in shadows, crimson speckles inside—
And shaking with bees, far up in their cones.
I know how this works. Like fierce aliens,
Their brief ambition sucks the energy
From the late-spring day, first from the cats
That lay depleted under cool sword ferns,
Then me, willing to put my yard work aside,
Give what I can, these lines, to their brilliant ride.

—from Rattle #23, Spring 2005
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