Garden Verses: The Morning Glory Speaks

I open for no one.
 Not really.

You think I bloom because of light?
 Because the sun coaxes me?
 No—darling, I choose it.
 I feel the hush before dawn
 and decide whether the world has earned my softness.

Most mornings, I let it.
 Some mornings, I don’t.

I was born to spiral.
 To climb.
 To reach where wood and wire
 forget how to bend.
 I wrap myself not in submission—
 but in insistence.
 That even trellises must learn
 the shape of my hunger.

And yes, I blush.
 A deep, impossible violet—
 like ink spilt in twilight
 or the bruise left
 when a god kisses too hard.

You think that’s beauty?
 No.
 It’s warning.

I sing in pigment.
 I spell my name in chlorophyll.
 I die each night
 so I can open again—
 not for you,
 but for myself.

But today,
 he stopped.
 He noticed.
 And in the pause between sip and sigh,
 his gaze lingered just long enough
 that I didn’t unfurl for the sun—
 I unfurled
 for him.

Just once.

Just now.