Betsy Robin Schwartz

You grew peonies in your palms

and lavender followed your feet.

Cherry and orange blossoms fell out of your head.

When you laughed, sweet basil passed through your lips

but, changed to jasmine when you sighed.

Oh, the aroma—being so close to a garden of you;

a garden that grew and grew

and renewed with the frost.

Planted in the ground with thornless roses,

you still enrich the good earth of many gardens.