My lies etch into your heart, and I wish you never believed in mine. The lilies in mom’s garden morph scarlet. Fingers sprout in place of pedals
to writhe. Coach passes down a weathered blue belt.
What kid deserves to don dead cloth chanting goodbye? Monroe witnesses my name manifest in ways mundane. Stars shift with Sirius to spell it.
Was I that iconic? Why must we all breathe even when drowning
in boney soil?
Why must this town topple and toil
as if it has lost? Exhale. I am now a sunflower, malignant roots ever obscured from view.
Set to decay in an overgrown alleyway, I will never be able
to again hurt you.
Poetry by Harlee Harris
Image by Adam Strong
Harlee Harris is a writer and soon-to-be English graduate out of Northern Louisiana
Backwards Trajectory 