"These Damaged Petals"

Classic/Inspiration

From “The Rose That Grew from Concrete”

By Tupac Shakur

You see,

You wouldn’t ask why the rose that grew from concrete had damaged petals.

On the contrary,

We would all celebrate its tenacity,

We would all love its will to reach the sun.

Well,

We are the roses.

This the concrete.

These are my damaged petals.

Don’t ask me “why?”

Ask me “how?”

Response

“These damaged petals”

By Jason Kohls (2017)

Petals that cling desperately,

As if fluttering to earth was a spiralling into hell,

Turn brown around the edges,

Lose their crimson hue,

And their delicate grasp,

Making that descent to the dirt that lay beneath.

But it is not into the flames of torment that the petals

Fall.

Not toward the searing pain of death,

But, in reality,

Quite the opposite.

As the drying petal falls,

It leaves behind a scarlet blossom,

Beautiful and delicate,

One whose fragrance still dances on the night breeze,

For it is only as the rose sheds it damaged petals,

Letting them flutter to the earth from which it grows,

Can the flower’s beauty

Turn itself to the sun,

As the petals, preserved in their dried state,

Remain about the rosebush,

A part of the past,

That leads to continual future.