Convolvulus, by David Hopes

Posted on September 5, 2019

Convolvulus

By David Hopes

The white convolvulus conquers everything

in the vacant lot.

What were separate things-

a wheelbarrow, maybe, a crate,

a big air conditioning unit-

stand glazed over, blended;

made supports, uniformly emerald, allowing

the emerald either to rise up or to subside into

the shade,

rougher than any sea, though silent. It’s white

trumpet flowers

fanfare its progress.

It has begun to climb utility poles, floating up

(against gravity and intuition)

toward its apparent goal:

heaven, the arrogant sky,

the blue, open air where it

may send out tendrils, grasping

greeny fingers, where it may seize

(some midnight, when our backs are turned)

the one place we imagined

could not be overcome.

The Halcyone Literary Review

Volume 2 * Fall/Winter 2018

Bio: David Brendan Hopes is a prolific poet, playwright, and painter. His plays Abbott’s Dance, 7 Reece Mews, Edward the King, and, most recently, The Loves of Mr. Lincoln, have been produced in New York. The Black Mountain Press will be releasing his new book titled, Night Sleep, and the Dreams of Lovers, a novel placed in Asheville, NC, in the Spring of 2018. Hopes also wears other hats: He runs a theater company called Black Swan, acts locally, and is a professor of literature and humanities at UNCA.