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Ladyslippers

In my time of magic and the season
I took a woodland walk without a reason
Save to fill my soul up once again with joy
Wishing once again I was a boy

Pine needles sent their fragrance through the air
And white and silver birch trees were still bare
The dappled ground below was flecked with gold
But my body seemed forever cold

A hopping swarm of grey-green frogs create
Mosaics of the mossy rocky grate
Along the sodden bank I walk along
As I hum attuned to brook’s sad song

And suddenly I spot a glimpse of pink
That looks as though it would prepare to sink
Beneath the leaves and needles of the ground
Deep away and down without a sound

Trod softly to the center of the glow
Soft ladyslippers round the roots do grow
The shoes of faery-folk left in the grove
Fineness and all delicacy wove

The curves of its enchanted form recalled
A hairless place just yesterday appalled
By folly on a bicycle’s boy bar
High above its pedals and too far

Translucence of the orchid folded in
The female principle without the sin
Its beauty and its mystery did call
From out my heart the purest love, not fall

Endangered lovelies that would be possessed
And taken to one’s home to be caressed
Would better thrive if they were left alone
Places of their spirit be self-sown

This flower did await another day
Indeed it was in pine woods, and in May
When lady’s slipper turned itself around
Danced in gladness round what it had found

For there would be no garden of the world
Had flowers not their dancing love unfurled
The tendrils of their networks show us where
To tend again our world – should we still care.

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