found lost plucked
from a roadside
deep in pine woods
with thickened plots

one after another
they disappear
like unreliable narrators
who chase characters

from different stories
written by different authors
on different continents

they all look the same

the nearest botanical garden
lost its orangery roof lantern
in a hurricane decades ago

you can’t get there
from here where people
encased in glass throw only stones
from the ripest drupes