Ode to Hibiscus in Haiti

Yesterday I needed to write a few Thank You's and searched out some Haiti-inspired greeting cards that I designed a few years ago, just after Hannah was born and my creative brain was bursting. I haven't touched the cards for a couple of years, but you may have seen them in the OMS Haiti gift shop. 

Last night I got a message from Jill, whose daughter Annie wants to memorize one of my poems (featured on a greeting card) for a Recitation class, but can't find her copy. Here it is, Annie!

 Ode to Hibiscus in Haiti -- by Kate Michel, written 2007

I wake and sense the cool of the morning
in what the Arawaks rightly called
Ayiti, the 'land of mountains'.
I step outside and its beauty
takes my breath away. The
tightly-knotted hiding place
slowly unfolding to embrace
all that the day holds.
It reaches out its petals,
like the layers of rich fabric in the skirts of a
lady of bygone days. Its
extravagant glory proclaiming that
God is still on His throne in this troubled land.