[2] Eulogy for a Sunflower

Eulogy for a Sunflower
by Deidre Price

The hue of you has smiled at me
mornings when only you were awake
and I, the sleepy fellow, met you
with hardly a crocodile smile.
I am sorry I did not blossom back
now that you're gone.

Big and brown bellied,
you grew taller than expected
with leaves that harnessed light,
bringing forth beauty and rest
for lying caterpillars and lipstick ladybugs.
But you moaned and curled in the heat.

I understand now that there comes a season
when everything must wilt,
even you, Sunflower, one so strong
that when winds came, you couldn't bend but just break,
bringing me this hardest lesson:
Sometimes the One who made us has to end us.