A red rose
Soft and silky,
Wrapped in plastic
She receives her valentine’s roses.

Every year her Dad buys flowers
Mom accepts lilacs,
Her sister loves her lilies,
She gets red roses.

They last a couple of weeks,
If kept right.
Bathed in water, soaked in sunlight;
Adored even when they begin to wilt.

She cares for them, protects them, nourishes them.
She loves them almost as much as she loves the man who gave them to her.

Every year,
They appear her room on February 14th,
With a little card with a chocolate kiss attached,
That reads,
“I love you to the moon and back”

One morning,
February 14th,
She awoke to an empty room,
To a quiet house.
Her roses were nowhere to be found.
They told her it was an accident,
It could have happened to anyone.
The car just hit the worst possible spot.

The one thing that survived,
Was a single red rose.
With a burnt card attached,
“I love you to the moon”