The Life Expectancy Of Carnations (Poetry)

Two bunches, one pink one white,
separated by supermarket cellophane,
each with a food parcel sellotaped
to their severed stems
and more like their tissue paper imitations
than real flowers, petals
twisted into tight swirls,
edges uniformly crinkled, two-thirds open.

Mixed in a vase, sixteen heads just
proud of accompanying gypsophila,
they pose all but scentless but perfect
in a casual arrangement,
the pink ones the first to droop,
they barely make their fresh-cut guarantee,
fading fast, outlasted
by their so-white stiff-necked sisters.

As though horticultural genetics
somehow geared it this way, dividing
their natural family first by colour,
the lesser beauties surviving just long enough
for contrast, while the stronger ones display
their staying power —
still supreme after ten days — a sign perhaps
of pure breeding.