flowering unawares

A flower
cannot smell its beauty, or
delight in the spread of its petals

It's all for the birds and bees,
and the flower babies
that it hopes to get
to compensate in some sense
for the nettles.

It has a sense:
of sunlight and shade,
of passing breeze,
of vibrations made
as you step close to stoop,
perchance to sniff
perchance to pluck -
make away with it!

The flower exists,
serene in it all. Pressed
between leaves, or left
to breathe in the pause
between spring
and fall.