Redbuds

By Ace Boggess

Why are they called redbuds

when they’re sort of purple, I ask,

as I do every year when I see them

highlighting hills along the highway

like thousands of painted lips puckering—

not the bright, blinding boldness

of red lips in the Rolling Stones logo,

or after a one-night stand, the red

of a lipstick kiss on the bathroom mirror,

not even the overly-red red

smeared across a drag queen’s mouth

when the show ends, the last song

played, final dollar paid for a kiss.

More a mauve or mulberry

like it was meant to be red

but someone forgot to adjust

the tint & brightness on an old TV.

Why do I ask this every year?

I’ve never gotten an answer.

I like to think there is no answer,

that it’s one of those mysteries

like how I smack the back of my foot

on a door when I’m moving forward.

There has to be an answer.

I could look it up on Google

or Wikipedia, type in the search bar,

Why are they called redbuds

when they’re sort of purple? &

then Google or Wikipedia would tell me,

ruining the magic of what I see

speckled amidst such green,

a masterwork I lack words to describe

aside from this question

meant more for my benefit

than as a search for truth.

Ace Boggess is author of six books of poetry, most recently Escape Envy. His writing has appeared in Michigan Quarterly Review, Notre Dame Review, Harvard Review, Mid-American Review, and other journals. An ex-con, he lives in Charleston, West Virginia, where he writes and tries to stay out of trouble. His seventh collection, Tell Us How to Live, is forthcoming in 2024 from Fernwood Press.