January Retrospective

Journey Round the Sun: January

The two-faced god of closings
And openings,
Of endings and beginnings
Hurries us through the portals
Of a new year.

At Perihelion
Things move fast.

Around the neighborhood,
Christmas lights still up,
Pale fingers
Of magnolia blossoms
Probe the split seams of their
Leathery casings. Out by
The coast, fields of
Mustard turn yellow overnight.

Suddenly, days are longer and the
Dive-bombing hummingbird
Doesn't care who knows about it.
A gardener wonders: "Where did
All these weeds come from?"

Equinox

Journey Round the Sun: September

The crystalline light of a lowering sun
Fills the valleys,
Gilds brown hills gold,
Makes every trembling leaf and blade
A tiny mirror.

Equinox: Earth rides its axis straight.
Night and day see eye to eye.
Morning has teeth: premonitions of frost.
Noon blares hot.
Light and dark are in fleeting balance
While temperature see-saws.

Knowing the portents,
Birds flock for fall flight,
Swallows are gone,
Long-necked geese mark the sky
With directional signs, all pointing south.

We who enter a private autumn
Hear their fading cries
And remember the
Hurrying arrow of time.

Farewell to August

The pink lilies which are the hallmark of high summer in our backyard and all over the area are faded now. But before all traces of this fruitful August, just past, disappear completely, here is a memento.

Journey Round the Sun: August

Sudden pink lilies on tall bare stalks
Leap from dead ground.
Ripe fruit thuds into hot dust.
Perseids streak the night sky,
Space gravel burning in air,
Silent and swift as Newton's thought.

Earth turns in its spiral dance,
Leaning into light.
Up, down, around,
We all move to the same music.

First Freesia

Bud-burst flower furl
Unfolds pink light
Amid plum petal rain
And forget-me-nots.
Chaliced beauty heralds honey
and sweet air of late March.