Galanthamine

Essence, type daffodil; snowdrop and a bluebell,
might slow Alzheimer’s, as a bunch in spring of either,
brings back one memory or another, tinged
with something fresh, fresh as nostalgia.
She’d often speak of their blend with one other,
when pestle and mortaring the petals of a rose.
It was a machine that told me she could resuscitate
a frozen flower by touch alone, a breath,
and the proof was right there in the scent,
a longing, a locked-in memory. Unspent,
if she had never before met a rose.

They were not her favourite flower - tulips, yes,
anemones spiraling out and over a plump vase.
They were sea creatures until, otherwise;
otherwise, how was one to know?
What memories, longing, and nostalgia,
would come with a bunch of bedside flowers,
when anemones are sea creatures,
and petals sleep in deep freezes?

Where we were, when everything
is mostly dark, and mostly cold,
ordered, warding off the chaos
of the thaw
for one less. Narcissus,
milk of bluebell, for nightmares
- for tears
which dampen heat and cool like sweat,
some in flames were met in the flannel on her brow
holding a hand so tight memories burn,
burn out, and some burn on so bright.

What if no one had ever shown her
the soft petals of a rose?


2013
Kate Hirsch