Wednesday, January 5, 2011

Maybe it was not a

spot requiring ask at first,

prior the cowled grins fell limp
into coal carved melanin ash,
scorched brick orange grime
they came back one, creak footfalls
slipping past cabled green walks
where a coral snake slithers, asks
of palm filtered light oh! holy day
to please wind the ring's handless clock
in black some fire dappled timeless way.

Or so it occurred to me.

They scattered to nim an emerald eye
in a red clutch of mangrove shadow
knotty near the block house umbra
Spanish moss moist with hidden life.

This should never have been touched
or used for the crispy sacred kindling.

The flight of a sole mosquito
sang the constellations cold
enough for klaxons to be sound
lights clicked on again anguish.

The moonrise was so much later than I guessed.

Equinox, the strong north west wind,
holds no regard for latitude,

or these funny little haps of solstice.

16 comments:

  1. I always enjoy the colours you bring to the images in your poems. The stanza about the mosquito is outstanding.

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  2. @Tree: Thanks so much. I really do appreciate the read. I am not so enlightened as to have completely effaced the ego. Ha!

    @Gordon: Color makes abstractions palpable for me. Cheers and thank you for reading. This was a hiatus from the sonnet run. This poem resisted all attempts to be 'sonnetized for your protection'.

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  3. I like this one too....full of private secret things. The damn solo mosquito note is very real, too. As good an excuse to look for the moon as any. Thanks, Gerry -
    PG

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  4. @Old 333: Good old old old. I can always count on you to understand me. Thank you.

    There. I fixed that. Apologies. of course.

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  5. i like the feel of this whole piece, but i especially like how you have interspersed the more terse comments in between the more languid pace of the longer stanzas...
    quite lovely.
    happy new year, btw.

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  6. Very nice...this is the first time I have read your work - really enjoyed it will look for to more...bkm

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  7. you are all about the pictures you weave with your words. wonderful!

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  8. I love Spanish moss. And I adore the line "The moonrise was so much later than I guessed." Nice, Gerry.

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  9. @Harlequin: You're right. It is a 'feel' piece. This was the feel of place I camped that just would not be a sonnet, thereby breaking that run, which seems to have ended as mysteriously as it began. I stopped fighting and just wrote it the way it wanted to be written. Thanks.

    @signed_bkm: Welcome. I appreciate the time you took to read this. There's a lot of content out there, much of it quite good, and for you to spend some of that precious time reading me means a lot. Thank you.

    @shadow: Pictures make the abstraction for me. What does they mean? I don't know. Ha!

    @Tess: Thanks. Glad you like. Speaking of Spanish moss, someday, you'll have to tell why you dropped the 'willow'.

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  10. Such delicious language! I must read more.

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  11. @SDS: Thanks for the read. Come as often as you'd like. The admission price is extremely low. ;-)

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  12. Gerry,
    I am so pleased that I reserved this poem for the peace and quiet of a Sunday afternoon.
    I loved the place it took me to. Very peaceful, as led by your imagery.

    Best wishes, along the way.
    Eileen:)

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  13. @Eileen: Thanks dear. Glad it took you anywhere at all. Could this be the end of the sonnets.

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  14. scorched brick orange grime

    Old English buildings often have this look - a far cry from mangroves or Spanish moss, but not above the odd mosquito, more's the pity. Some things are the same the world over!

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  15. @Jinksy: My daughter's have bulldogs, but this was inspired by faces in the campfire. Not sure if you knew that I've become nomadic. My wife and I sold everything, bought a camper van (caravan) and are wandering about the states. We're blogging the adventure @ http://astralsnomads.blogspot.com Follow along for hijinks (or hijinksies) and vicarious thrills.

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Yes?