Betrayal in the Lotus
janine canan
The door is closed.
The house snuggles into the hillside,
newly planted with rapid orange impatiens.
The whole hill rests in the slope of an open heart,
whose vibrant petals once rose and fell
in loving prayer.
One by one the tender petals were shredded
and torn from their dutiful stem;
yet the battered stem
miraculously bloomed again --
vaster, more dazzling, in every petal
a world of jeweled light.
Still, deep in the shade of one purple petal
stands that house brightly lit, where unfaithful
lovers lie -- deliriously content.
