The Rose of Horners Lane--By Marianne Szlyk--United States

The Rose of Horners Lane

Here, in Rockville, I am a springtime flower,
leaning over the chain link fence.

I spring up
red yellow orange white
sometimes even pale lilac
almost blue or gray.

I join the cherry blossoms
the dogwood
and the lilac--
if she can make it.

My humans cherish me,
bringing my blooms in
to color the cool, dark rooms.

The last rose of summer comes early here.
I bide my time until fall.

Marianne Szlyk recently published her first chapbook, Listening to Electric Cambodia, Looking Up at Trees of Heaven, at Kind of a Hurricane Press: http://barometricpressures.blogspot.com/2014/10/listening-to-electric-cambodia-looking.html. Her poem "Walking Past Mt. Calvary Cemetery in Winter" was nominated for the 2014 Best of the Net. Her poems have appeared in print and online, most recently in Poppy Road Review, bird's thumb, Black Poppy Review, Of/with, Walking is Still Honest, and Literature Today as well as Kind of a Hurricane's anthologies. She edits a poetry blog-zine at http://thesongis.blogspot.com/ and hopes that you will consider submitting a poem there or voting in one of its contests.