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This week I received my first poetry swap poem from Rose Cappelli. Rose sent a dreamy note tablet, a Mary Oliver poem, and a cascade poem about peonies. As Rose explained, in a cascade poem, each line from the first stanza repeats as the final line of each subsequent stanza. Rose does this seamlessly.
![](https://reflectionsontheteche.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/a-cascade-of-peonies.jpg?w=1024)
My mind has been on the flowers, prompted by Mary Oliver, Rose, and Maggie Smith. I subscribe to Maggie Smith’s Substack newsletter. This week she wrote about naming things.
“I love when I can accurately identify things when I see (or hear) them: a bird, a tree, a flower, a constellation, a kind of nest. (As the poet Pattiann Rogers once said in an interview, ‘naming is a form of honoring something.’)”
Maggie also writes about not knowing the name of something and how that can lead to wonder and discovery. I found a flower in my mother-in-law’s collection of pots that she nor I could identify. We could tell it was a type of hibiscus. I began by writing a list of metaphors. I am still playing with how to insert the not knowing, but wanted to share the small poem that I wrote in my notebook.
Hibiscus Moment
You are Love’s red lace,
blooming beet-red bow
on a woman’s flowing gown.You open only for a day
flirting like a spool of yarn
to a kitten, taunting usto feel unhinged with marvel.
So much bravery
in your fleeting face.
(Margaret Simon, draft)
![](https://reflectionsontheteche.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/swamp-hibiscus-rose-mallow.jpg?w=1006)