Weedflower

It’s too late
for me to die young
grew up like a weed
but I’m
scared of the sunlight
living under rain clouds
so I’m sickly pale
in my heart and my petals
I litter the ground
like raindrops or alkali tears
salt water fills
the dead sea
floating like flowers
and I can’t see
through it in my eyes
but I know a set
of ten soaking fingers
and two sodden sleeves
that can sweep away oceans
stained dark from the ink on my hands
and the black liner
layered like frosting on my eyes
the icing on the cake
and that is all I am
no substance left
I’m just a shadow
but shadows don’t exist in the rain
without a streetlamp, and
my dingy excuse for a sun
just burned out
like that washed out art teacher
I idolized, the drugs
in her car,
not even hers
but the prison bars hers
cold and unwelcoming
her arms following suit
and I draw for no one anymore
just to cover the white on the walls
of a barren room
facility, they call it
care for crisis
as if I’m a tsunami
but the dead sea doesn’t have tidal waves
and so I can’t crash
just burn
like autumn leaves and weeds
and I’ve seen too much
to leave my yard a mess
so down the weeds go
only room for flowers now
cut me down
but I’ll grow back
this time and next time
but maybe not the time after that
because maybe someday
I’ll learn to drop the shears
and appreciate
that the shear magnitude of
briny blue-green ocean
does not need contribution from
my tear ducts
or maybe I’ll find a field
where they grow weeds
and call them wildflowers