The English ivy blossoms in the yard
as ugly as the fungus where a tile
lost its grout, tenacious and as hard
to kill. In shape like jacks collected while
the ball allows, they’re wasp-attracting signs
of pestilence and immortality:
pale-toned and too prolific, like the lines
of telemarketing vitality.

Beneath peculiar sky, those flowers spread
their awkward shapes, their undistinguished scent,
their stupid futures. Better they were dead
than uncontrolled. Better if they went
away with juniper. No garden needs
these rampant vines. We ought to call them weeds.