flowers are always so beautiful

a tempest of hues and scents

elicit visions of sprawling countryside hills and riverbanks

an ideal postcard destination for retirement

an enticing offer of peace after a lifetime of war

flowers are always so beautiful

when given to a lover on her doorstep

rubicund carnations wrapped in shoddy plastic paper

but to her they must have been mythical jewels

that could make venal kings gnash their rotten teeth in envy

flowers are always so beautiful

carried by a maiden cloaked in alabaster

as she marches down the mossy cobblestone aisle in her sensible flats

in the villa garden her old money family owns

in-laws exchanging glares across the banquet table

flowers are always so beautiful

calla lilies, goosefoots, and asphodels cover our honeymoon estate

but I yearn to follow the gold rush

i greed for the sea, soil and sun

so I embark on an odyssey for fortune and prestige

but epic poems are always greek tragedies

i feasted on ambrosia and nectar with the mighty gods

and demigod kings bowed their heads as I passed

i drained the seas and I gathered the soil

but as I longed for the sun in its brilliant glory

zeus struck me down with a calamitous thunderbolt

and i fell

repeating the mistake of Icarus

i reached for fool’s gold

my wings melted from rays of insouciance and solitude

my prophetic fall immortalized in paper and pen

and my euphoric high erodes into a hard truth

flowers are always so beautiful

as crimson roses laid on your grave

alabaster veils corroding into abyssal shrouds

mythical jewels robbed and pawned off

to repay debts of shame and lost time

as your marble tombstone weathered and cracked like the ruins of the Nekromanteion

i was left with nothing