Aesthetics

Fresh cut flowers on the windowsill

Sun streams in, the room is set

Only, we are pacing the aisles of the megastore

Searching for happiness stacked on a shelf

Another Saturday sacrificed

New garden to seed, room to redecorate

All wilted by next season’s palette

Kingdoms built today by a life compromised

Just a click or tap away

Always though, a step too far

Made to break; never to last

Why is the question for the day

Back to the flowers

Sometimes sticks will do

Add a touch of imagination

And you may find…where beauty resides

-Camille Delaquise

This poem appears in The Precipice, Camille’s third contemporary poetry collection. Aesthetics reflects on the tension between consumer desire and true beauty — suggesting that what nourishes the spirit is rarely found in accumulation, but in attention, impermanence, and the imaginative act of seeing differently.

This poem is available as a contemporary poetry print on textured recycled card.