Butterfly weed

July 15, 1981

In season silently, out of the slender upstanding pods, the finely pubescent follicle minarets tapering greenly a loft in fall when turrets discolor to gaping verdigris: butterfly seeds of oval umber body winged with circular white floss, layer on layer leave their dehiscent muezzin porch for meccas of distant fields and roadsides where in time a-fire they rise and arrange air with an orange umbel, wearing such bright coronas of aureole summer they bear a numerous glory far into hallowed place s from Maine to Minnesota, Florida to Mexico.