The gardenias in the day garden
demand your approval.
They are beautiful in white
and their scent travels through the grass
with the sun slanting down like a wish.
The garden parades them, glossy
as pearls, all season and through summer
before the wind lifts each bloom
and each bloom disappears at the first snap of ice—
leaving a stem
choked into a depression in the dirt,
invisible
as the air under the bride’s veil
being lifted and thrown back.