I’d just come in from helping dad weed the roses in the garden
when my brother mick said: hey, shithead – here’s a hard one:
what’s the fundamental purpose of a rose?
I said : to look and smell beautiful I suppose
no, he said. dummy
you’re so funny
no. roses are there to make other roses
it’s got fuck all to do with human eyes and noses.
that’s it. that’s all there is. basic reproduction.
it’s a little thing you might have heard about called evolution.

it upset me at the time, and still, quite a bit
I was fond of nature and he was spoiling it
like he’d stuck a pin through my chest and put me in a cabinet
with a latin name, a label, and I just wasn’t having it
I mean – it was sad and insane
was life really just a numbers game?

it was like asking a gardening robot a logic bomb
a rose to make a rose and on and on and on
till its circuits smoke and its eyes glow red
and it crashes face down in the flower bed

I LOVE roses. Still – I admit it
I wanted to rip one up and hit him with it