Trillium at Tryon Creek
So simple, this triumvirate
of leaves, petals, sepals
that rises from the humus of winter.
Modest beauty, virgin of the forest,
your petals fluting like white tongues
of the Holy Ghost. I can hear the
wood nymphs chanting your name
in the damp shadows
beneath Obie’s Bridge.
You offer your root, a sacred herb,
to cast spells of love
to calm the birth of a child
or to soothe eyes scarred by
what they did not choose to see.
Wake-robin, bath-flower, Indian shamrock
I kneel down to inhale your essence
talcum scent of mother
borne from the dark earth.
©Margaret Chula 2009
