Cleavers--Galium aparine
My daughters used to have cleavers wars
when they were younger, they'd race
to grab the biggest, longest runners
joyfully flinging them at each other, whoever
got the most to stick was the winner.
Cleavers are like that,
their long stems and whorls of leaves
covered with Nature's own version of Velcro,
microscopic curling fingers that cling,
grasping onto shirts and skin,
rough and scratchy. It used
to remind them of the prickles of their father's beard.
Their father is gone now,
and they don't have that carefree time
to play with cleavers anymore
and I see how every day they might be slipping
away from me and one day
poof! off like dandelion seeds under a single breath
to college, careers, jobs, and lovers, apartments,
they will fly away on the wind currents of life.
And yet they will remain.
They are sticky, little whorls of Galium
Wrapped snugly around my tattered patch-work heart.
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