What happens when love becomes larger than the self? “Child of the Rose” is a meditation on love as both creation and surrender.
The rose, the sea, and the daylight are not merely images of beauty—they are thresholds of transformation. This poem captures the moment when love transcends the self, when devotion becomes an energy moving through nature, silence, and art.
It invites the reader to enter a tender space where giving, remaining, and dreaming become one continuous act of love.
Child of the Rose
by Cathy Xinman
Child of the rose,
I hold an armful of ocean-flowers—
how can I enter your daylight?
The waves of heat you paint
come from the sun.
You give yourself to the grape,
sweetness filling the earth.
In the places your eyes never see
are the poems I have written.
They have never touched blood;
for the first time, they surge
like the sea.
My devoted love is a flame.
Each day, the flowers are full,
yet no eyes have ever loved them.
Poor poems—
no one can make them sorrowful.
Daylight returns with you,
my dearest rose.
Now you may come home,
while I remain,
both your patient
and your devoted dreamer.
Cathy Xinman writes poetry in English and Chinese. Find her English-language collection, Where You Love Yourself, on Amazon. You can also hear her poetry on her TikTok page. Learn more about the communities that make up Canada on the Toronto Spark website.
