Greenhouse Complex

Poetry
Written By Mary Simmons

—Golden Shovel after Sappho

I scour rooms of dying flowers for someone

who might yet trill my name in

the night. I arrange fish bones for some

sign of permanence, trace the future

across trembling palms, keep time

in this transparent box under soil, and I will

plant orchids, my contribution, I think,

to all that is dead and dying. Petaled martyr of

martyrs—have mercy on this wilting, and on us.

Mary Simmons

Mary Simmons (she/they) is a queer poet from Cleveland, Ohio. She is the author of Mother, Daughter, Augur (June Road Press, October 2025). She earned her MFA from Bowling Green State University, where she also served as the managing editor for Mid-American Review. Her work has appeared in The Baltimore Review, ONE ART, trampset, Moon City Review, Variant Lit, The Shore, and elsewhere. She lives with her cat, Suki, at the edge of the woods.

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