As I have begun doing recently, I will share the poems and pictures and then provide an explanation at the end. See you at the bottom of the page! Enjoy!
Snapshots
Sunbeams
The sunbeams skitter through mid-May shadows,
Flicker across the fusty forest floor,
Glimmer among the dazzling damp meadows,
And glare full force on the stream’s stony shore.
At the Mouth of the Spring
The bubbling spring murmurs;
Its breathless echo shimmers,
Rustling the tender green leaves
On wood oats budding in sheaves.
Komorebi
(Japanese for “scattered light through the trees”)
It is light at war with darkness;
It abides no murky places,
Nature’s clarity and starkness,
Dappling all her empty spaces.
A Row of Birches Along Sylamore Creek
Pale shepherds of mossy brown stones,
Thin birch trees, like vertical bones,
Stiffen against an absent wind
That will never convince them to bend.
Butterflies, Blue Stars, and Fire Stars
Butterflies brilliant as lucid dreams
Tickle the hairs of Blue star blooms.
The Fire star’s crimson dreamily streams
Through a waft of wild plum perfumes.
Lonely Fern on a Bluff Edge
Lonely fern nestled
In a rooty nook
Beneath a gray stone overlook
Where the sun’s sustaining beams
Are never seen,
How do you thrive?
How do you survive?
How do you stay so green?
A Grave Vine in a Fence
The possum grape tendrils tightly wind
Through the links of a wove wire fence.
The stem is leafless and gray near the ground,
On the barbed arms, bushy and dense.
Suspended in three prickly strands,
The vine stretches higher and higher.
Clearly, it must misunderstand
It has bound itself to the wire.
Well, here I am again. Let's start with the pictures. All of these pictures were taken during the walks that Kellie and I take--surprise!--in the evenings around sunset. They are also all taken at the same place, which is by the shooting range at the Fulton County fairgrounds area. In some photos, you can see the same trees and hills. In others, the blackness of the trees and hills seemed to clash with the colors or fade them out, so the pictures were taken above them or I cropped them out. Still, all of these pictures were taken at the same place in the last few days not more than a week past. The first and second pictures were actually taken of the same sky about 40 minutes apart. The second is the latter one.
The verse snapshots here are lines that I am stealing from old poems that I will never rewrite. These few lines of verse are not nearly long enough to be nature songs, so I have come up with another "thing" that I will do for the next book: snapshots in verse. We will see how that goes.
As always, I would like to know what you think about the snapshots--and the sunsets as well. Remember, I do take requests for poems.
Oh, and check this out! I will be not be going to work from December 14 through January 9. I might have some time to write! I should probably spend that time revising, but, if I haven't told you before now, I dread looking at works that I have already written with a mind to review and revise. Yeah, I know. It is necessary, but...
I have no more to say after the "but." See you around in a few days, I hope.
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