Realistic Flowers

September 29, 2014

Heather Christle (pronounced “crystal”) is the author of What Is Amazing (Wesleyan University Press, 2012), The Difficult Farm (Octopus Books, 2009)...

At the dollar store I bought
a bouquet of fake flowers
and what could have been
but somehow (incredibly) wasn’t
It only cost $2 but still
that did not help
                               I planted
the flowers among actual flowers
b/c what else can you do
I was so happy I could have
torn your head apart

Heather Christle (pronounced “crystal”) is the author of What Is Amazing (Wesleyan University Press, 2012), The Difficult Farm (Octopus Books, 2009), and The Trees The Trees (Octopus Books, 2011), which won the 2012 Believer Poetry Award. A new collection, Heliopause, will be out in spring 2015. Her poems have appeared in publications including Boston Review, Gulf Coast, The New Yorker, and The Best American Poetry. She has taught poetry at Antioch College, Sarah Lawrence College, the University of Massachusetts Amherst and Emory University, where she was the 2009-2011 Poetry Writing Fellow. A native of Wolfeboro, New Hampshire, she lives in Yellow Springs, Ohio.