The Black Flower

Photograph:  courtesy of Ula Kapala
of Wroclaw, Poland
and sxc.hu

THE BLACK FLOWER

             Iris Chang, author of The Rape of Nanking, 

                died on November 11, 2004

           

1.

Sick to Death

At dead of night she woke, unmoved

  By the crickets, moon, and stars;

From old they sang or shone above

    The fire and rape of wars.

Then pity was a crumpled child,

  Kindness a battered womb,

And all the world one genocide,

    The grave her living room.

2.

Iris

The iris by my walk is bold,

  Its purples almost black,

And stems and petals always bleed

    Before the sheathings crack.

She took her life to lift the veil

  Of grief--and still, I’ll bet

That most will never remember

    What Iris could not forget.

"The Black Flower" originally appeared
in storySouth and was reprinted
in The Throne of Psyche(Mercer University Press, 2011)

***
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