PEONIES

When I was a child, our backyard was graced with many peony bushes.  Each May I would watch as the tight buds slowly began to open (with the help of the large black ants that Mom called "piss ants") so that by Memorial Day all the bushes were in full bloom.  Splashes of pinks and white kissed with red, pure white, and a deep purple adorned our yard.  Those flowers were a mystery and a wonder to me. 

While I do not have peonies of my own, many many homes along my path do.  And I've been able to not only enjoy their beauty but also to reflect on two of my favorite poets and their own works on the topic of peonies.

PEONIES by Mary Oliver

This morning the green fists of the peonies are getting ready
to break my heart
as the sun rises,
as the sun strokes them with his old, buttery fingers
and they open ---
pools of lace,
white and pink ---
and all day the black ants climb over them,
boring their deep and mysterious holes
into the curls,
craving the sweet sap,
taking it away
to their dark, underground cities ---
and all day
under the shifty wind,
as in a dance to the great wedding,
the flowers bend their bright bodies,
and tip their fragrance to the air,
and rise,
their red stems holding
all that dampness and recklessness
gladly and lightly,
and there it is again ---
beauty the brave, the exemplary,
blazing open.
Do you love this world?
Do you cherish your humble and silky life?
Do you adore the green grass, with its terror beneath?
Do you also hurry, half-dressed and barefoot, into the garden,
and softly,
and exclaiming of their dearness,
fill your arms with the white and pink flowers,
with their honeyed heaviness, their lush trembling,
their eagerness
to be wild and perfect for a moment, before they are
nothing, forever?

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PEONIES AT DUSK by Jane Kenyon

 White peonies blooming along the porch

send out light

while the rest of the yard grows dim.
Outrageous flowers as big as human

heads! They’re staggered

by their own luxuriance: I had

to prop them up with stakes and twine.
The moist air intensifies their scent,

and the moon moves around the barn

to find out what it’s coming from.
In the darkening June evening

I draw a blossom near, and bending close

search it as a woman searches

a loved one’s face.