I breathe, I spit, I am.

[callunav]

Outside my office building there are some rosebushes with blooming and budding flowers amidst the ripe rosehips. They make me happy, just because nature so often defies expectation. They also make me grin, because every single time I walk past them, my mind offers up the lines,

                  But take no further notice.
I'll just nod in at the window like a rose;
I'm a black and frosted rosebud whom the good God
Has preserved since last October.
Take no notice.

(Christopher Fry, The Lady's Not For Burning)

Comments

[redbird]

If it wouldn't give away too much information, where are these rose bushes? (The forecast being what it is, I might try to visit them tomorrow, if it's somewhat compatible with other plans for the day.)

[callunav]

Alas, probably somewhat out of your way. They're closer to Providence than to Boston.

If you look around, though, you may find others. It's less rare than you might think: outside my apartment back when I lived in east Somerville, there was a winter-blooming (biannual) rose. I don't think it's a breed, just a lovely anomaly, though I don't really know.
For quite a while, I had a dried rosebud on my altar that I cut fresh, with thanks to the bush and leaving others behind, on the winter solstice.