These days of open fields and gentle skies,
flocked with birds and golden flakes,
when poplars whisper
through their thinning leaves,
I look about the blue and empty space
to see who creeps the meadow,
to see who speaks.
Tag: autumn
Last morning of the lighter half of the year
green and blue
through the mist
merging ephemera
with tree pillars
holding up the sky
In the air
Photo ©Beverly Orozco
No darker than the last night,
no colder beneath the same stars
and flood-lit moon,
but the leaves have lost their voices
once fallen, and the drifts crisped dry again
beneath a tardy sun
await the wind that comes from the north,
carrying unflinching skeins of geese,
and sweeps with relentless strokes
before the sill of winter.
Dying back
The jaunty cheerfulness of wildflowers blown,
flown with the swift, silent swooping of the swallows.
Brown stalks stand still,
though the rot has taken the juice from them,
stark reminders of what has gone,
and only hope in the hypothetical return
of the warm certainties of what once was,
lingers among damp roots,
burrowing deep into the cold earth.
Poem in Visual Verse
Chill
No autumn this
chill and solid rain
no mellow fruitfulness of fruit
already fallen shrivelled in the heat
the brusque shift brutal
the slope too steep
we shiver
unacclimatised
no autumn flame fading
from fierce to mild memory
leaves blown already brown
sink beneath the torrents
winter-cold
to an ignoble end
sludge beneath heavy boots.
The ocean rises these days
to wash away the sun
the dust of summer
with melted ice in its breath
the ground bones of glaciers
and the world changes
the rough beast we have woken
slouching not to be born
but to devour our prattling
and sabre-rattling idiocy.
Gogyohka: autumn rain
I look for light where there is none,
taste the wind
for a salt memory of the sea
and touch the wild grasses
for the fleeting presence of a hare
wind blows
full of damp grey ribbons of cloud
streaks and shafts of steely grey
rain-wet and dew-wet
and a scattering of noisy finches
dusk seeps and creeps
beneath the cloud
between the rain drops
among the raggedy grass soldiers
still standing
Haibun for a change in the air
The season is changing. The rich summer ending and memories of bitter winter ruffling feathers and fur. The trees around the house are full of songbirds again and a blackbird has made his HQ above the nail where the bird feeder will hang. A hare appears now each evening, coming closer to the house, squirrels chase beneath the oak trees where deer shelter, and in the evening, the dark is charged with owls’ cat-calls and foxes barking at the new moon.
changed air
heat gone from the gold
falling leaves
dance with birds
all finding their place
Oak
Haiku challenge: Empty & Whole
A tanka for Ronovan’s weekly haiku prompt.
Painting by Rajasegar
sky empties of rain
dry rivers flow again
from dust to sea
red leaves weave with silver fish
the cycle complete