The Rose is Obsolete
 

The rose is obsolete 
but each petal ends in 
an edge, the double facet 
cementing the grooved 
columns of air -- The edge 
cuts without cutting 
meets -- nothing -- renews 
itself in metal or porcelain -- 

whither? It ends -- 

But if it ends 
the start is begun 
so that to engage roses 
becomes a geometry -- 

Sharper, neater, more cutting 
figured in majolica -- 
the broken plate 
glazed with a rose 

Somewhere the sense 
makes copper roses 
steel roses -- 

The rose carried weight of love 
but love is at an end -- of roses 

It is at the edge of the 
petal that love waits 

Crisp, worked to defeat 
laboredness -- fragile 
plucked, moist, half-raised 
cold, precise, touching 

What 

The place between the petal's 
edge and the 

From the petal's edge a line starts 
that being of steel 
infinitely fine, infinitely 
rigid penetrates 
the Milky Way 
without contact -- lifting 
from it -- neither hanging 
nor pushing -- 

The fragility of the flower 
unbruised 
penetrates space 
 

to deadpoets    to Moongate