oh winter bloom in March
you greet me in the arboretum
before summer beauties arrive
your spidery flowers wave to me
threads of delicate silk
red orange yellow pink
your fragrance not captured by Dior
your loveliness understated
bark from your branches most prized
your bare twigs and limbs
boiled into tea to drink
or mixed with animal fats,
a poultice made by Native Americans
today we still benefit
from your wood
steamed distilled preserved with alcohol
to soothe irritated skin
for me you eased the pain
of my first ear piercing
I praise your medicinal magic
call you by cultivar names
Ruby Glow Athena
Copper Beauty Citronella
Foxy Lady Glowing Embers Winter Dawn
I invoke your healing powers
a balm for suffering in the world
—
Ellie Bates is a member of the Martha’s Vineyard Museum, Polly Hill Arboretum, Cleaveland House Poets, MV Poets’ Collective, New England Poetry Club, and International Women’s Writing Guild. Her collage work of images and words has appeared at Featherstone Center for the Arts. Her writing has been published in the Vineyard Gazette, MV Times, Cleaveland House Poets: 50 Years and In the Company of Poets. Other credits are Covid Monologues MV, PathwaysArts: New Works 2020-2021 and the Island Educational Journal: Refocus. Ellie’s photographs and poetry are in her three small chapbooks: Everything Changes, Rooted in Change, and A Collage of Poetry. Her book, Seasonal Wonderings:Poems for Summer Fall Winter Spring was published by Kelsay Press in 2022.
