Gasteranthus Extinctus

Last night’s broadcast discussing climate anxiety
was interrupted by the magnolias dying outside,
shriveled pink, fried at the stems by frost.

A week of charred petals (sponsored
by the MacArthur foundation’s commitment
to build a more just and verdant world)

cling to green shoots the way a memory will stay:
my daughter picks blossoms from a fallen pear tree,
their translucent sequins against asphalt.

What is the name for death’s expectancy?
Correspondents recall scientists naming flowers
for their extinction, a birthing sense of dread,

which reminds me to attend to death
before the dying, Look Daddy! But I don’t
want to grieve for the planet anymore. Scientists,

new ones, rediscover thriving flowers untouched
by sprawl or the cancer in my father’s veins,
a premature nostalgia.