A Gift of Daffodils

 by Brett Rutherford

Part One of "A Northumbrian Wedding"

1.

A Gift of Daffodils

“I was given the gift of daffodils.” —
“How sad,” I say. “So brief a bloom
despite the glory they bring for a day.” —
“Come see,” the old one, smiling, says.

She puts her apron aside and rises,
strutting the cobblestones on spindly legs.
Her feet, I see, end not in shoes
but wide-spread lily pads. Duck feet
could not be more sure of tread
as she led me to the shaded wall
beneath St. Cuthbert’s church. There,
tiny narcissus-daffodils peeped up.
“That’s fine,” said I, “but in a week
the petals fade and fall. Yon rose
blooms over and over again. Mistress,
I shall gift you a bed of roses.” —

“Nay, sir, with daffodils I stay,
for what I plant here, blazons
above.” Just then, as I looked up,
the organ pealed in all its octaves
and light filled from within
the ancient, stained-glass window,
not a saints suffering, or Christ a-cross,
but an endless vista of gold
and white athwart green spears,
twenty feet high and every inch
a portrait of exploding daffodils.