Open Link Night #198 The Smell of Green

Tonight is Open Link Night at dVerse Poets Pub. You can submit one poem of your choice as it is no-prompt night. Come join us for some elclectic reading! http://dversepoets.com/2017/06/15/openlinknight-198/

The Smell of Green
As I sat on my back steps
I pondered the smell of green.
I was looking up at the mini moon,
the strawberry moon.
It’s a mini moon because it is farther away
from the earth on the apogee of its orbit.
The moon hasn’t changed sizes though.
and still I ponder the smell of green.
A moist southern evening –
It had rained an hour earlier and
the air was redolent with the smell of green –
freshly mown grass, the herbs in my garden,
The smell of the bushes, vines, and trees –
In my kitchen this night I had made a gremolata –
full of freshly chopped parsley, chives, rosemary, lime zest –
To spread on the chicken breasts I had baked.
Green – romaine lettuce, arugula, a salad of green
dressed with good green California olive oil –
it smelled so green I felt my fingertips tingle.
And then later,
I stuck my nose into the bag of pot I had bought –
The tightly dried buds smelled of pine and Thai basil.
I breathed in the smell of green as I sat on the back steps
and pondered the smell of green,
Smiling at the mini moon.
I had placed mama into hospice –
I was letting go.

dVerse Poets Pub – Open Link Night

It is Open Link Night at dVerse Poets Pub. You can submit any one poem of your choice on subject and form. Come join us!

I hope
night falls gently in mid-May –
the sun fades but it is still bright
yet muted. birds sing their night songs
and the cardinal on the wire
serenades his territory –
Thweeeeee purty purty purty!
honeysuckle drifts on the gentle breeze.
the world is preparing for sleep.
I hope it is a restful night for all
I hope it is a night with sweet dreams
and full stomachs and hearts full of love.
but I hope. I hope.

dVerse Poets Pub: OLN

Today for OLN at dVerse Poets Pub….http://dversepoets.com/2016/10/06/open-link-night-181/

The Last Crape Myrtle Bloom
Second week of October –
Last week was cool.
this week it is hot again.
the trees and grass are still green.
The crape myrtle has dropped all its leaves
one bloom holds on –
persistent under a lowering sky.
Matthew is scouring the east coast
ripping away homes and lives
two hours inland it is ghostly still and quiet
hot humid grey – perfect hurricane weather
The last crape myrtle bloom of summer
Holds on persistent under a lowering sky

copyright kanzensakura

Open Link Night #180

Today Bjorn is hosting at the Pub.  It is OLN which means Open Link Night in which we can post one poem of our choosing on any subject, in any form.  Come join us!  https://dversepoets.wordpress.com/2016/09/22/open-link-

The Calendar is slow
“Autumn knocks softly…” Toni Spencer

Today the calendar says it is the first day of autumn.
The weather is screaming late summer.
All the leaves are still green,
the sky is still the clear blue of summer,
the nights are still warm and moist
and filled with the sounds of insects.

I long for cooler weather,
for the Arabian tapestry of colored leaves
and the rich tangy snap of apples
in my mouth –
The smell of fallen leaves and rain
and the profligate gold of small wild sunflowers
blooming in ditches and fields –
a frosty morning
and deeper blue of autumn sky –
longer nights and shorter days.

The Hunters Moon is a round silver dollar
In the sky.
The Milky Way spirals around it –
Silver pennies – change for the moon’s pocket.

I long for autumn.
Oh! How I long for autumn.

dVerse Poets Pub – Open Link Night

Thursday is Open Link Night at dVerse Poets Pub.  Any poet can submit any one poem of their choice today.  I have submitted a tanka for my choice.  Come join us and discover your new favorite poet!  The pub opens Thursday at 3:00 pm. https://dversepoets.wordpress.com/2016/09/08/openlinknight-179/?iframe=true&theme_preview=true

 

Indian summer vine –
tiny rust flowers clamber
up to the blue sky
eager to see if autumn
has gotten closer to home

copyright kanzensakura

d’Verse Poetics – Open Link Night #152

Today is Open Link Night at the d’Verse Poetics Pub. This means we submit a poem of our own choice of form, subject, etc. without following a prompt. Come join us today – add a poem of your own or read submissions by extremely talented folks. It has been brutally hot and so, optimist that I am, I am looking forward to cool weather and snow. My poem today reflects my love of snow – anytime, anywhere.   http://dversepoets.com/2015/07/23/open-link-152

January at the Beach
January – alone at the beach.
Gone are the self-conscious preening teens,
The children like raucous birds, their waists
Encircled with neon colored plastic swimming tubes.
Gone the sun worshippers – glistening with oil
And inviting skin cancer and admirers with equal aplomb,
Vendors wheeling carts of ice cream, cold sodas, beer –
The wave splashers and wave riders and wave surfers –
All of them gone.

January – alone at the beach.
Just myself and the dull tawny sand,
The gunmetal grey sky above, sea birds wheeling
In the limbo between grey sea and grey sky.
Into the salt air comes a breath of sweet –
I close my eyes and inhale, knowing.
Sitting there alone waiting…
Now the sea birds become silent as they dip into the ocean
For luncheon and even the waves, loud in the silence,
Seem to subdue and grow quiet.

January – alone at the beach,
Sitting on my blanket huddled in my down jacket –
I listen, I think, I inhale and then…
Like an errant feather from a high flying bird
The first snow flake circles downward and
Lands on the shell beside me.
More fall – large at first and then
Smaller and faster falling.
I stand and walk to the edge of the surf
Letting it brush against my boots.
Against the horizon, the snow is more plainly seen.

In the deep cold, the snow feathers coat the shells
Pebbles, seaweed, sand – mostly melting but making
fuzzy outlines on the forgotten artifacts
castoff from the abandoned ocean.
I hold my face up to the sky and laugh and stick out my
Tongue to taste the snow.
Snow falling and disappearing in the ocean,
Snow falling and slowly melting on my coat.
I haven’t spoken to anyone in several days.
The ocean, empty sand, birds, discarded shells
Are more than enough company.
I hold out my hand and snowflakes fall on my glove.
They stay long enough for me to fall in love
With each and every one before they disappear.
January – alone at the beach.

dVerse Poetics – Open Link Night 150- 俳文 初雪

Today is Open Link Night at dVerse Poetics and it is #150!!!!!  We do not submit to a prompt but rather, submit a poem of our choice.  I have done a haibun – 俳文 – for first snow – 初雪   Please come join us.  Submit your own poetry and read the offerings of very differently talented writers.
http://dversepoets.com/2015/06/04/open-link-150 

初雪 Hatsuyuki
Deep winter and total blackness of the night. The stillness of the night awakens me as if it had been a deafening clap of thunder.

I lie under the quilt, warm and cozy but….something in the atmosphere beckons. I change into jeans and heavy sweater, socks and shoes and open the front door. Since going to bed, it has begun to snow.

Ignoring the cold, I step out onto our front porch. Miraculous transformation! Smooth glowing white covering the yard. Against the blacker than the black night trees, silvery white snow has clumped into vees of little branches – night blooming winter magnolias they seem to be.

I carefully go down the steps and into the yard, turning slowly to see all around. The air is cold and sweet with the perfume of snow and it is so silent…so very silent I can hear the snow falling – a slight hissing sound as tiny flakes strike against each other, slough off from each other, group together and fall.straight.down.

I look up at the sky and can see the snow clouds against the black of the sky. I lift my face – bit of instant fire touching my cheeks, lips, eyelids….I hold out my hands.
It is the first snow of the season:  初雪 Hatsuyuki

midnight: snow flowers
spiral down and quickly die
on my outstretched hand.

I walk to the trees at the verge of the woods. I can see against the rough black bark where bits of snow have settled into the crevices of the bark – like exotic plants on the steep side of the cliff. I touch the snow with my lips – soft cold against rough and then melting. I bow my head against the tree – I murmur 侘寂 wabi-sabi

The stillness, the snow, the silence. I am no longer here but there – years past on the viewing platform at Ryoanji. On the wall sit hundreds of suzume – sparrows. Like me, they are watching the rocks in the 枯山水, karesansui. Feathers fluffed against the cold, tiny bright eyes seeing all. I watch the rocks, silent, down jacket pulled close against the cold. The air becomes sweet and before the suzume begin to flutter, I know…snow. I feel them on my face before I see the flakes and soon, they stick to the gravel, to the moss around the base of the rocks. The birds flutter off to more sheltered spaces but a few stay for the crumbs the humans leave behind.

Ryoanji and hatsuyuki. I stay until the moss is white and the suzume have all left. Straight down and fast, the snow falls. I stand and bow the long, deep bow of deepest respect. As I leave, it comes together for me – impermance, the beauty of imperfection, the deep sadness at the passing of things – the snow that melts, the birds that fly away…and the rocks that stay behind.

Snow falls. White *sho-ru.
Silence drifts to cover rocks.
Peaceful dragon sleeps.

*shawl