Hope

Hope, I lost you in the garden
with the name of flowers
so true that they follow us
to our grave, and later leap up
for the eyes of our nameless progeny.

Hope, I glimpsed your corpse,
positively, in books of guilt,
long after I refused to vote
with my soft feet
and instead went about my father's work.

Hope, I couldn't recognise you
behind those glasses and moustaches,
or in that blood-red lipstick and those hoopy earrings,
tricking me into playing my part, too,
for laughter and for love.

Hope, I falsely accused you
of good deeds that you might not have committed,
then I hid when you knocked on my door,
and later I wrote this poem,
sincerely, to apologize.