This common periwinkle was the first flower to bloom in our yard this year, so it wins the award for first flower of the year. As you can see in background, there will be thousands of them.
It seems that in posting only one poem last week I have plenty of poems to post this week. How about one right now?
No Sound in Dreams
I find in dreams I hear no sound,
No falling timber’s creaking groan,
No red-faced lover’s breathless moan.
I wonder, would dreams come unwound
If I were to sense a noise?
To listen to a dead man’s voice
As he rises from the ground?
What are these visions in my brain
That from the smallest sigh abstain
Yet in all other senses are unbound?
What silv’ry clouds float through my drapes?
What wondrous fare? What wild shapes?
And yet what din, or whisper, can be found?
My poet’s dreams float in the air,
So beautiful, so bright and fair.
They never seem to touch the ground.
And that is why they seem unreal
Because all I can touch and feel
When I’m awake will make a sound.
The picture above is Partee Spring from the near side where one walks in.
Last week, my picture album in Wix showed that it was full, and I could add no more pictures to my blog. Therefore, I bulk deleted the whole batch. Little did I know, it deleted all my pictures from all my blogs. What a goof! I hope that I can somehow arrange the pictures so that all of you can see them again. It won't be here on this blog though--not likely anyway.
Kellie and I went on our annual Flower Hike yesterday, Saturday, March 9. Last year, we were two weeks late, and we found a lot of wilted blooms and dried flowers. This year, we were about two weeks early, and we saw a lot of leaves and stems of flowers that will be, so we have no pictures of bellflowers, bee balm, or wild daffodils. However, not all is lost. Here are pictures from our walk yesterday with captions below each, telling what each flower is.
The Common Verbena
A Yellow Indian Paint
Redbud Tree against the Blue Sky
Red Sumac Berries
Yellow Aromatic Sumac
Rue-Anemone
That is it for the flowers on the hike. How about some shots of Halfway Creek and Partee Spring? But first, Check this out! I found this bird nest in a sumac bush. The tannish-white that you see on the inside is a shed snake skin. The bird lined its nest with the skin of its deadliest enemy.
Bird nest lined with snake skin
Halfway Creek on the Flower Hike
Kellie's Close Up of Partee Spring
Kellie taking risks to get a close up of Partee Spring
Finally, I have two pictures that cause me to wonder. Was there once a wall around Partee Spring? Take a look at the pictures and tell me if you think those rocks look natural or if they were laid by human hands.
With all the talk of flowers, how about I include one more poem with flowers in it. This poem is a partner to What Dreams May Come in Atheists and Empty Spaces. It is intended to explore the bizarre nature of dreams. I hope you have enjoyed the pictures from our annual Flower Hike. Enjoy the poem. See you next week!
What Dreams May Come
(Part II)
I hear Mother calling for dinner,
And I spring from a war-torn play town.
The first child to his chair is the winner
So I fling plastic Army men down.
I run to the washroom unhindered,
Just as quick as my tan legs can get.
As best as I ever remembered,
No sibling has beaten me yet.
I douse the soap to get it wet,
Dry my hands that are barely damp,
Race down a hallway I’ve yet to forget,
To a dinette lit by a lamp
Where I sit in a room of blank faces,
‘Round flowers as bright as the sun
In off-white ceramic vases,
Each full of spry blooms except one.
Who sat in those empty spaces?
I think of some names but have none.
I only remember flowers,
Daisies we gathered one by one,
And building Tinker Toy towers.
Did that man really call me his son?
He was among the very best of men,
This faceless being I cannot recall,
He placed our daisies in a tin
And nailed the pitcher to the wall.
It hung too high to sprinkle with water,
So the daisies never did last
Nor the yearnings he had for a daughter.
Why did they all dry up so fast?
Here’s the Bible that sat on his dresser
With Samson in blue and in chains,
The seal of St. Ed the Confessor,
And a tree leaved with all sorts of names
On the first pages of that holy tome.
He had pictures of kids in black frames
And an embroidered “God Bless This Home,”
A three-foot stack of popular board games
In this house where the buffalo roam,
And I wonder, still I wonder,
Where have all these vestiges gone?
In the nook between the bedrooms
Hangs a gold-framed triple mirror.
Its reflections are all costumes,
So it shapes the past no clearer.
Time is less flawed in the garden,
And I dawdle there for hours
Until someone asks, “Beg pardon?
Are you the old man who picks the flowers?”
“The one who plucks the daisies is not me.
That silly man is hoary and bony.
You’ll find him up the pin oak tree
Or astride a painted pony.”
I think that that is what I said.
I don’t remember much past that.
I feel such a weight on my head.
I wish I could doff the lead hat,
But a feller needs a cap on a trip
And I am a man in motion.
I think it’s safer on a ship
Whose paint is blue as the ocean.
But still, the memories tumble
Before waves of an epochal sea
Like the daisies in Pa’s pocket crumble
As I bounce on his ageless knee.