TRAILING ARBUTUS

Like a virgin whose beauty

Can tease and entice,

So was the arbutus,

Forbidden but nice.

 She trailed her long vines

Emitting her scent

But permission to pick her,

Not given consent.

 Endangered, her species,

Protected by law,

To the plight of this flower,

My sight had a flaw.

 Embracing her beauty,

I held her up close

And drank in her fragrance

That outranked the rose.

 As guilt ran all through me,

for her roots now exposed;

With regret, I now threw her;

This flower disposed.

 I watched as she wilted,

My conscious, it pricked,

I watched her lie dying;

Guilty, the verdict.

 Trailing arbutus,

remembered so well;

No more have I seen her

Or fragrance to smell.