Four roses drinking from a blue vase,the first one I name Moment of Gladness,the second, Wresting Beauty from Fear.All year I watched my beloved disappearing, the sweet fatof her hips, her laughter, her will,as though a whelk had drilled through her shell,sucked out the flesh. Death woke me each morningwith its bird impersonation. But now she has cutthese Clouds of Glory and a honeyed musk sublimesfrom their petals, veined fine as an infant’s eyelids,and spiraling like any embryo — fish, snake, or human —and she has carried them to me, saturatedin the colors they have not swallowed,the blush and gold, the razzle-dazzle red, rivenfrom the dirt to cleave here briefly.And now, as though to signify our fortune,a tiny insect journeys across the kingdomof one ivory petal and into the heartof…