White Rose by Georgia O’Keeffe

I wonder if Ms O’Keeffe knew flowers

were not made for humans

but were designed for insects, hummingbirds

bats-in short, pollinators.

Humans just think they were made for them

when they give them to their mothers

and other loved ones, in congratulations, at death.

And flowers get little in return.

Her flowers were said to be a means to make

the unknown known and she worked especially

long and hard on edges trying to fuse one surface

with another, smoothly and with grace

trying to remove difference. I wonder if every artist

has some object on which she works out her obsession.

The center of this white and black nautilus with wisps

of green or yellow in the curves

draws the viewer in like a flower would a pollinator.

I think perhaps she did know flowers.