by Gillian Lee
One superior alternative universe would be one where the flowers have voices. I like to imagine it this way that a zucchini flower, for instance, which is a most lovely soft thing with wrinkles, like it was just born and is wilting…I imagine a zucchini flower would moan or sigh if you walked by on a day you looked particularly lovely, had put on pink lipstick and a dress with pearl buttons, moan in a voice you would expect a flower to have, quiet and sweet and pining and breathy like a flute plus a young girl. Daffodils would obviously make tiny trumpet noises; trumpets are the sonic embodiment of orgasm but from a very small bell, from ankle height, it sounds so innocent. Jasmine flowers sound just like they smell, like flower milk, like dream voices as you fall asleep… and tulips have low voices, nighttime in the kitchen moonlight voices. And the hyacinths with their chorus of bells the hyacinths who think everything is funny and love when you (hyacinth girl) take them in your arms and run away. And the peonies have brides’ voices. The weather is so nice you wish they could read to you, you laying on the soft grass beneath the Japanese snow-flower tree which speaks softly, mostly says “I am sooooo….. tired….” it is exhausting to be so white and green when the sky is so blue and to shake in the wind, even slowly.
---
Gillian Lee is a poet and video artist from Virginia. Her poetry has recently been published on Gauss PDF, Datableed Zine and Dead King Magazine (forthcoming). U can find all of her published work kind of organized on her Tumblr and her videos on Vimeo. She tweets more than anything else and u can see that nonsense unfold @ twitter.com/whagever.