Green-Gloved Fingers
Pale green-gloved fingers
push through the forest floor.
Soon, fingers will rip out
their gloves’ seams and stretch into leaves.
Budded stems will stick their heads out,
and lady’s slipper flowers will bloom.
But today, I admire hundreds
of graceful green-gloved fingers
gently waving at me—
along pine-needled trails,
near fallen trees,
beneath unfurling ferns.
For decades, I’ve searched
for lady’s slipper flowers each spring,
but failed to notice the wonder
of their becoming.
Sheila Wellehan’s poetry is featured in On the Seawall, ONE ART, Maine Public Radio’s Poems From Here, Rust & Moth, Thimble Literary Magazine, and many other publications. She served as an assistant poetry editor for The Night Heron Barks and as an associate editor for Ran Off With the Star Bassoon. Sheila lives in Cape Elizabeth, Maine. You can read her work at www.sheilawellehan.com.
Amethyst Review 