orchid keeper

i lose my head & live a tiny green life.
in my house-sitting days every place
had orchids. they liked to speak in parables.
once, i sat down & a white & blush orchid
told me, "there was a girl
without any parents. she emerged 
from the earth." i thought the flower
was talking about me so i ran away
& did not get to hear the end of the story.
what happened to her? is that why
there's always dirt under my fingernails?
i think politics are awful & i would rather
just sit with the orchids & try to not die. 
i hated caring for my clients' orchids. i was sure i was
watering them too much or too little. 
one woman had a husband with a whole room
of orchids. the chatter made it hard 
to sleep in that house. they talked all night,
repeating their stories to one another.
i spent the last dark of my stay, in their room
& let their voices wash over me. i craved an answer
to my wandering & thought maybe
that they had one. i lived on the cold side
of the sun. my bed was a staircase & 
the backseat of my grandmother's old car.
the orchids asked me, "do you want to become one of us?"
i turned them down. i was worried about
not being able to eat oatmeal anymore.
it's the small pleasures. an orchid spat off 
all her faces at me in a house with too many windows.
i harvested them. tried to put them back.
nothing left but big green shoulders
& a neck to the sky. the faces were of course
still talking. they promised me that 
on the other side of a bridge, there would be
a quiet place of syrup.  a story is sometimes the truth
& other times a comfort wagon. 
i do not think i am equipped to own orchids
maybe just to keep them. i know too well
how fickle they are. how easily a head is lost
& then we're in someone else's house
looking out the window at a night full of eyes.