Plumeria
Haley Winans
You left me smothered
in warm mayonnaise, snuggling with wilted
lettuce between two slabs of stale
sourdough. My disguise lounges
in the crumby pit of your snakeskin
purse. I’m pushed under a crumpled
lei and a crinkly bag of hotel
macadamia nuts so I’m not fondled
and confiscated by TSA’s clammy sausage
fingers. This claustrophobic
terminal reeks of old people
soap and bleach. The echoing cackle
of a bloated tourist shrivels
my petals as bulging suitcases
clunk down the slatted ramp. I want
to be in the loamy luxury
of your terraced backyard
surrounded by flourishing foreign
breeds that greet me like a divine
alien. I’ll grow to lick
your window with my leathery
leaves and convince your guests
that my ombré blooms
are criminally fragrant
and worthy of California’s golden poppy sun.
Haley Winans is a ceramicist, organic gardener, and writer from Annapolis, Maryland. She has poetry published in Scarab Literary Magazine as well as The Shore. As a senior at Salisbury University, she’s studying environmental studies and creative writing, with specific focuses on environmental justice, sustainable agriculture, and poetry. In all of her realms of interest, she is heavily influenced by the intrinsic connection between humans and the environment, and the impacts they have on one another.
