Laurels
for Chris

I would take it with me, take a shovel to the soft
bucket of earth that hasn’t quite healed over

from the last time I dug and pulled out thistle
or the spindly stalks of grains that bobbed

their heads in a breeze too light for my hairs.
I would take it somewhere else to die. I know

that it takes the acid of deep Ohio soils but I
have killed the others–mowed them or let them

drown in burdock–before the pink beads of their
flowers could pop open like peppermints, spiraling

out in red and white. Because my husband
gave me three and I killed two. Because he

gave me three and nothing sent me to the back
yard and the yellowjackets and the yellowsun to guard

them and two died, and the third will die when I
leave, like a memory I am no longer here to keep.