Ode To A Cactus
A play on Keats, not with the same poetic structure, though. Just a structure I made up, lol.
Looking through Amber's art, I was inspired by this picture, which I realized, was sitting right in front of me.
Ode To A Cactus:
We shed water. It retains water.
It nourishes itself as we dehydrate our minds
We open our hearts. It guards itself with spindles.
It warns unwanted guests as we welcome suffering
That’s when I realized
What sprouted from the Earth
Has always been the most self-sustaining
Needing some love and care, coexisting symbiotically
But without dependency
While we have resorted to thievery, to codependency
To Greed, to neediness
To unending expectations
While we have woken up every day with uncertainty
With Guilt, Shame, and a lithe will to live
This small, green life force with spindles
Inhales, exhales, takes and gives
With no desire to overtake
With no desire to undercut
But just to exist as the tiniest piece of the largest jigsaw puzzle
A corkscrew in the machinery
That keeps us breathing, that has kept us in existence
With only the request
That we nourish her once a month
About the Creator
Sutheshna Mani
Freelance copywriter & social media manager by day, thespian by night. The shortened version of my name: Suthe (Soo-thee).
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