All summer it’s been twisting and winding,
twining around sunflowers,
stretching across pathways,
climbing the pea vines and the tall wire fence.
If there is a fairy godmother of flowers,
she must have said to the bindweed,
“I bless you with tenacity.” And forever since,
it has lived up to her generosity.
Why do I curse it for its persistence,
when I, myself, have made a life out of stubbornness?
Oh foolish woman who longs for beauty,
but pulls the bindweed before it is beautiful,
before its pale pink flowers open to morning
delicate as certainty.