Roses make very comfortable beds.
First you crawl between the petals,
(being careful not to bruise them with your gangly limbs)
shifting them gently,
until you reach the heart
the core.
There you curl like a fiddlehead,
like a moist little worm,
your body arranged in the fetal position.
You are surrounded by red,
by warm red walls;
a cocoon of scarlet sheets;
a plant’s womb for your worm.

If you shiver,
in your wet clothing,
the petals mold against your body,
applying gentle pressure,
giving warmth,
like many maternal hands.
Your nose is amazed.
Such a palette of smells flood it,
of innocence and newness and
pure red.
A pearly sweetness,
pungent and lulling,
overlapping your tongue like thin wafers
of touch and sense.

As I’ve said, love;
roses make very comfortable beds.