Story No.479
I have always been a late bloomer,
buried under fuchsia petunias and cobalt lobelia,
summer’s instant celebrities. Exhausted,
they wither in the cold dew, while I,
the canary yellow dahlia, sway in the cracked clay pot
and stretch my neck to kiss every ray of autumn sun.
Elizabeth Reed is writing a memoir about adventures like the leech attacks in Sumatra’s jungles.