Second Life

I left a flower in my book
I closed its pages, walked away.
I thought I would come back
And recover it another day.

It waited patiently for me.
But time is long when you are alone.
So off it went on a lively little spree,
A journey into the unknown.

It wandered through plots and schemes,
chatting with heroes and laughing with knaves,
And belles and beauties and fair maidens,
And rascals, and scoundrels and jackanapes.

He shared their losses and their triumphs,
their victories and in-betweens.
Line by line, it wove itself
into the fabric of their dreams.

One day, perchance, I picked up the book,
and turned the pages idly,
When something faint, a bit familiar
looked back at me, unexpectedly.

The petals were flat, as thin as the page,
Its form now soft, subdued, unsure.
I traced the outline with my hand,
as if the book had claimed it for sure.

The flower I’d left was gone for good,
no longer the thing it used to be.
It had blended into story and page,
and blossomed again as a memory.