Butterfly Ranunculus
Any news? text my friends as they
lose their jobs.
Only of ranunculi I want to reply
but don’t say how I pulled
them up from their name on the bin
to discover what I really
bought were tulips green as asparagus
with faint purple tips
and how this must be my mother making
her presence known across the state.
Each morning their lips open,
cheeks deepen into full purple as
the days crawl toward lighter evenings,
as my hips ease more into their
craving for the king pigeon pose,
like the hinge on the dishwasher soap
dispenser that stuck closed once
but still knows to lift just in time to clean.
In the evenings my phone is quiet
for the new poems gathering in the dusk.
Now I search the flower bins knowing
what I am looking for.
Still, I am surprised at the sheen of
champagne pink, the light, hairy stems,
the wild movement of anemone-
dark, erect pistils.
What do you think? I text you
and hold my breath.
lose their jobs.
Only of ranunculi I want to reply
but don’t say how I pulled
them up from their name on the bin
to discover what I really
bought were tulips green as asparagus
with faint purple tips
and how this must be my mother making
her presence known across the state.
Each morning their lips open,
cheeks deepen into full purple as
the days crawl toward lighter evenings,
as my hips ease more into their
craving for the king pigeon pose,
like the hinge on the dishwasher soap
dispenser that stuck closed once
but still knows to lift just in time to clean.
In the evenings my phone is quiet
for the new poems gathering in the dusk.
Now I search the flower bins knowing
what I am looking for.
Still, I am surprised at the sheen of
champagne pink, the light, hairy stems,
the wild movement of anemone-
dark, erect pistils.
What do you think? I text you
and hold my breath.
September 2025
Dana Murphy is a poet, writer, and critic originally from Altadena, California, with family roots across Cuba, Miami, and Los Angeles. Her writing has appeared or is forthcoming in Poet Lore, Fourteen Hills, Berkeley Poetry Review, Obsidian, and elsewhere. She is the author of the academic monograph Foremother Love (Duke University Press, 2025).
Art: Ellen June Wright, Diptych #1306, #1509, watercolor on paper