Crows In The Snow

 

 

 

 

 

 

Crows In The Snow

 

 

In the cold, in the silenced sun,

the eye reaches out

against the blind blizzard

for the heart of the rose.

 

In the fall of a dark feather

petals unfold

shed stark on the snow

in a blackness of crows.

 

Everything glittering

 comes to their eyes

as a clamor that heals;

gold light on the ice,

 

 

black feathers for blood ink,

 rosebuds from their beaks--

all dropped at my feet,

these bones in disguise.

March 2022

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 posted for earthweal's

Animal Poetry

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Images: Living antlers, artist unknown, via internet     Fair Use

Raven Steals The Sun, © Aaron Purcell     Fair Use

The Child As A Postcard

 

 

 

 

The Child As A Postcard

 

 

To the passing postcard written in

the massing uncolored sky, posed

in the medium of ice and flesh surely

my child-self seemed the response,

scribbled head high to the bare lilacs,

a winter blackbird lost in a fragrance

dancing to cold.

 

While the wind was witching, while it was

twitching my skirts, and its white book

came clattering down with the frost on every

page, while the sky snowed down with the pomp

and swagger of a drunken policeman, did the

heft then of my grandfather's arms know me

for myself as I determined,

as everything I determined 

thereafter came to be? Song or catastrophe,

the wide smile of the chimera, or its

diamond mask, the bright white light

of a lilac breaking bare in the snow while

I watched time plow its path

across my life;

not a moon-fair there, not a star to be seen

dropped from the basket of a lover's dream, 

only a stillness of snow haunting the hour

of papier-mache in a maundering dazzle.

 

 

 

 

January 2022

 

 

 

 

 

posted for

Shay's Word List # 10

Wallace Stevens

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Note: I have not tried to emulate Stevens' style. That is far above my pay grade. But I have tried to infuse the poem with some of his moods and fancies as I interpret them.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Image:Snow Effect: Winter In The Suburbs, © George Seurat

Public Domain. I have manipulated this image.

Winter's Relic

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Winter's Relic

Winter is on the steps

and in my hair. She croons

as she starves sparrows

rocks pigeons dead in the cradle.

Spare me her holy patience

her frost palimpsest on the window

her holiday coffins.

Feed me instead

on figs and sangria

scarlet under a firecracker sky

rippling with heat and Spanish moons.

 

Throw me on a bed white with

linen, not this nullity of snow that

 melts away beneath my fever.

Let me have something

besides these starving cats

under my skin, hear something besides the blues

they blow like a train-whistle from

 the feral saxophones of their  throats.

But if I open my eyes,

I see reflected only winter's relic;

a twist of shadow in the blizzard,

trying to hold back the wind,

while around me the plague

doctors work, looking for

blood from the stoned, and

the Fearless Captain stands at the door

overseeing our dispossession.

 

 

December 2021

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 posted for

Shay's Word List

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Images: Looking southwest from Five Barrows under Snow, ©James Ravellius Fair Use

The Snow Queen Flies through the Winter Skies, © Edmond Dulac   Public Domain 

Winter's Ship

 

 

 

 

 

 

Winter's Ship

 (a 55)

 

 Oaks on the hillside

know wind's desire

fear nothing but fire

become ships in harbor

to ride the waves' wire.

 

In winter without color

midnights without number

sun  cold as axe-snarl

even passion must freeze

or build a way out.

Wind-eater, wave-runner

dragon-faced prowler

king's-welcome coffin;

last home like her first,

the earth roots remember.

 

 

 

December 2021

 

 

 

 

 posted for dVerse Poets Poetics:

Passions Stamped on Lifeless Things

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Historical Note: "The Gokstad ship is a 9th-century Viking ship found in a burial mound at Gokstad ..Vestfold, Norway It is the largest preserved Viking ship in Norway. It is also the largest Viking ship ever found...During the excavations, a human skeleton was found in a bed inside a timber-built burial chamber. The skeleton was that of a man aged approximately forty to fifty years old, of powerful build..; his identity is unknown. The bones of twelve horses, six dogs, and one peacock were found laid out around the man's body.." ~wikiedia

 

 

 

 

 

 

Images: Gokstadskipet, Vikingskipmuseet, Oslo, 2005, Karamell, shared under a Creative Commons License via wikimedia commons

Danish Winter Landscape, detail, 1838 © Johan Christian Dahl

Friday 55 Holiday Edition 2020

 

 

 Welcome all, to the final Flash Fiction prompt of 2020, a Holiday Edition of the Friday 55. This year has been a slog, and it's not over yet, but the time has come to acknowledge it will not last forever, and in fact is in its last throes of weirdness and upheaval as we speak. Whether your mood is celebratory, contemplative or still an utter roil of feelings, you're invited to write it all out here, in 55 words, no more no less, on any subject that strikes your fancy.

 

I will leave the page open for contributions til December 31st at midnight since this is a busy time for all, even in isolation. 

 

Post the link to your 55 in the comments below, and I will be by to mark the passing of this Hell Year with you.

Brighter Days Ahead.

 

 

~ *~

 

My 55, such as it is:

 

 

 

 

 

 Supplication To The Old Year

Jack Frost, Jack Frost

crack the wind

for what we've lost.

Kiss the tree,

break the wood.

Show us all that's gone for good.

 

Toss the cow over

the mad moon's head.

Put stars on her horns

in the land of the dead.

 

Numb my hand, burn my ear;

then keep your promise and disappear.

 

 

 

 

 

December 2020

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Images: Vintage Victorian Christmas Card, circa 1890  Fair Use

Illustration for The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayam, © Edmond Dulac  Fair Use

Cow and Moon, © Alex Colville    via intyernet   Fair Use

 

 

The Last Afternoon

The Last Afternoon

It was a day where even

the rain holds a grudge.

I'm too dry for rain

to do much good; too old

for paper castles

to wall out

the night coming,

the grey wolf walking.

Only love can do that,

on the last afternoon

when I'll

hold her head
heavy with wolf-dreams

on my knees.

February 2020

a 55 for

The Sunday Muse

(and a reminder that the Friday 55 will be next week)

Image: photo-manipulation © Sarolta Ban    Fair Use

Friday 55 January 19 2018

Another Friday, another chance to remember and to work with the Friday 55, a meme for writers long maintained by a good man now departed, but for many of us still present in memory, Galen Hayes. Here we write for the pleasure of writing, with no rules other than that each example of prose or poetry contain 55 words, no more, no less. If you are in the mood for the exercise, link your example in the comments below, and I will be by to read and appreciate. The 55 will be alive from early Friday morning through Sunday morning. As always, comment moderation is off, but I reserve the right to apply the delete key to any passing trollish ones.

 My offering for this winter wild week in January ...

Winter Gods

Winter
tests the craven

and the brave

 limping calf, ravens' black eye-sparkle,

 days short of breath

lopped 

at the knee
by snow-padded knife.

Still
the gods hunt wild

calling where green light raids

the skyliving now.

Wolves

follow the herds 

 howling the words to
godsongs of blood,

old hungers' lore,

scenting ahead
the last home.

 ~January 2018

Optional Musical Accompaniment

"...Who shall sing me

into deathsleep sling me

when I on the path to Hel go

I sought the songs

I sent the songs

then the deepest well

gave me tears so harsh

of Death-father's  wager..."

(from Helvegen, translated)

I've written of the Wild Hunt before; if you're unfamiliar with it, there is a quick reprise of most of the myths associated with it here. 

Images :Northern Lights in Iceland, The Wild Hunt, via internet, no authors known.
Fair Use.