An ode from a hollyhock

My translucent arms stretch into golden light that has poured into the cracks of your misshapen life. I am a hollyhock seedling and I grow in defiance, of your broken routines, of schedules ticking like an unbalanced metronome. You picked me last summer from a secret garden, nothing more than a seed, one of many hundreds. Scattered like uncut gems in a jewellery box, each of us harbouring a future unknown. I was shoved into soil in a terra-cotta pot, a garden spell thrown in for good measure. And then the sudden lurch from one day to the next, a strange new windowsill to call my own. I was hidden from you then, as you poured tears of despair – today was supposed to be your solo concert. Instead this new life, of quiet and birdsong. The very next morning I stretched out a hand, an olive branch in your troubled time. I saw your joy in my tiny revolution, new life appearing whilst others were falling. I dance subtly when you bathe me in sound, your bassoon stirring my leaves with music. Less soothing are those attempts at scales and the strange noises your new reeds make. I love it when you wear that dress, the rare occasion you’re not in your nightie. And I love the little rituals with the cat, throwing paper balls that you hope he might fetch, which he does with fervour but refuses to give them back. I wonder sometimes why you don’t go out, why you don’t drink the daylight that fills me with life. Your fairylights are your stars and your mirrors your expanse, your fresh air an oil diffuser and your company your laptop. We listen to the goldfinch sing, the little wren and then the evening blackbird. Diamonds of song cutting through clean air. Yet something is changing, ever so slightly. The morning stillness mumbles with traffic. Something is changing and I sense your tension, will all this be undone, the break nature has relished? You leaf through your diary, a ghost town of cancelled concerts. What will happen to those musicians and artists who take us to places far beyond this crazy juncture? As my leaves greet the evening glow, somewhere I know, that just as you gave me life, so too will creativity give you yours, whether confined between walls or out in a perhaps more balanced world.