Winter Hiatus

Did I neglect to render you the full due
of admiring attention when your splendid
blooms shared sublime colour in the garden?
You peonies and columbines, periwinkles
and bleeding hearts, roses, lilies and phlox
in a glory of evanescent shades brilliantly
lighting my life, did I fail to fully appreciate
your role in fulfilling my need for such
beauty to confront my eyes and gladden
my soul? Did I not exclaim with such
unalloyed pleasure whenever my glance 
turned your way at the delicacy of your 
petals, your divine fragrance, the spectacle 
you presented of how the Garden of Eden 
must have appeared to those who left it 
with such sorrowful regret? We have
experienced this wrenching separation
before and each time you have dutifully
returned, but in the hiatus of your absence
my memory fails me whenever I make
the frequent effort to command its mystic
powers to bring to me the exquisite
sensuality of your grace, your scintillating
presence, the sensations your presence
evokes within the deepest chambers of 
my being, in the hallowed presence of  
the mistress of existence, my garden muse.