Sunday, May 29, 2022

New Poetry by Zebulon Huset










On the Cusp of Summer, Minnesota
            for my mother

During the couple weeks
when the neighborhood
bloomed a pale blue-hue
then burst full of purple
we’d round up armfuls
of the lilac buds. We’d
bust out every stadium
collector cup and every
dollar store and garage
or yard sale vase and on
every flat surface precariously
perched some water and
a rubber-band-bound bunch
of dying blossoms. As kids
we never suffered through
the disposal of their dried
husks with the slimy bit
of mold clinging to the stems.
We merely knew that our lilacs
brought spring into the house
just before school loosed us
for another raucous summer.


- © Zebulon Huset 2022


Zebulon Huset is a teacher, writer and photographer. He won the Gulf Stream 2020 Summer Poetry Contest and his writing has appeared in Best New Poets, Meridian, Rattle, The Southern Review, Fence, and blueppeper among others. He publishes Notebooking Daily, and edits the literary journals Coastal Shelf and Sparked.

2 comments:

Sherry said...

I love the smell of lilacs. This is a sweet memory--with a hint of sadness.

Adrienne ("A") said...

Lovely poem!