Make the Dark Darker

Mist on the mountain

Has melted into sunshine-

The morning is here.

Blur of evergreen

Behind the sharp dead tree leaves--

My kitchen window.

Last winter's pine cones

Lie in the strips on the road.

Where will they go next?

Late in the season

Bee sucks from goldenrod--

Hope springs eternal.

High above others

Rhododendron plant reaches.

(There always is one.)

Shadows etch the barn,

Darkly sliding up driveways--

Make road mosaic.

One spot of sunlight

Lights up a piece of the stone wall

Making dark, darker.

Standing on its stem

Dead leaf absorbs the sunshine

And glows as if alive.

Pathway to Nowhere

Just outside the bank,

Two deer munching and grazing;

(Waiting for teller?)

Ten shades of sunshine

In front of kitchen window

Sifting through the leaves.

"Happy Fall," he said;

"Beautiful", I respond.

The jogger jogged on.

Instant water ponds

Stare into the sky above,

Reflecting the trees.

Moss-grown gray slate lies

In the middle of the lawn:

Pathway to nowhere.

Dead evergreen tree

Stands before its living kin--

Juxtaposition.

Through and over it:

New green leaves and steel railing--

Soft force of nature.

Many eyes peek out,

Watch with different irises,

From the same road bush.

 

Phantom Horse Gallops

There is no sunshine,

Still all the bushes are green;

Above, yellow leaves.

Creeping on my porch:

Soft, green moss on a wood plank;

Nature keeps crawling.

My front yard jungle

Grows freely and without care;

I just look at it.

As still as a leaf

Tiny bird sits on a branch;

Then he flies away.

Cushion on gravel

Raises some telling questions:

For whom? Why? What for?

Solitary blooms

Spring up above the dead leaves

Their petals dropping.

Phantom horse gallops

Through the delicate branches

Of the dying bush.

Old white bathtub leans

Against equally old tree;

Both missions over.

 

To Eternity

Last day of summer--

Dead leaves have taken over;

Gray winter's calling.

A wind shakes tree limbs;

More leaves floating through the air.

Where is the sunshine?

Crows are commenting;

They're babbling back and forth

On this gray wet day.

Beyond the bushes

A rooster crows out of sight;

Just his sounds remains.

He did not make it

Racing across the small road--

To eternity.

Stream has an arbor--

Green leaves above the ripples;

Sound and sight combine.

Mirrors on the road

Dark, tiny pools of water

Reflecting the trees.

Eternal bouquet

Grows from the iron railing;

Always flourishing.

Bovine Ablutions

Bird feeder awaits

The food and the feeding birds;

(But not the squirrels). 

Sun has run away

Chased by the lumbering clouds;

More leaves are falling.

Collette takes a quaff;

Olivia takes a scratch;

Bovine ablutions.

Dead leaves on the rocks;

Below swollen stream rages--

Two faces of Fall.

Dead leaves are resting

On the rich green plant below;

Fall marches slowly.

Two dead leaves lying

On the decomposing rock--

Transit gloria.

Crickets in the woods

Singing their loud scratching song

Become a sound wave.

Heard but still unseen--

Water under the bushes

In the roadside stream.