The rose I stole from the grave of Thoreau

July 7, 2006  (I was 61) 

The rose I stole from the grave of Thoreau

nine years ago this week

still resides in Walden page ninety-seven

pressed against this fore-noted epitaph:

“Shall I not have intelligence with the earth?

“Am I not partly leaves and vegetable mould myself?”

Knowing the rose and inscription are there

brings me occasionally back to the volume

and back to the deed at the Concord gravesite

on the 180^th commemoration of his birth.

Members of his official Society placed the flowers

which I later co-incidentally arrived to find.

Without a tribute to offer, I took one to preserve.

With the same rash purpose I opened a random page

that brought me to the quotation.

Thumbing I find assigned sophomore pages marked

in Economy and Civil Disobedience

I hang around with Brute Neighbors,

peruse the poems of smoke and mist

and search in vain for a voice

with which I might bring life to Inspiration.

To my nose

I hold the rose that reached back from his grave

and I fold it back into its page.