After the magnolias
but before the roses
comes lilac country.
I spread a blanket
on the grass and wait
for the lilacs –
they bloom
in an instant.
A snapshot of spring
so fragile; seven days
where everything is
perfect.
Lilac Country
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Tag Archives: Poetry
The Kettle Boils
What sight is more beautiful than
a dog and cat curled in a
handmade quilt while the rain
patters on the tin roof?
Alone, with just the:
House
Dog
Cat
& thoughts.
Then-
the kettle boils.
A siren song to life, my tea
black as night, sweet as song.
Late to work as I climb the stairs,
Fully dressed- shoes on,
To look once more at the
dog and cat curled in a
handmade quilt while the rain
patters on the tin roof.
Pebbles on the Riverbed
If I could choose to be anywhere
In this great, wide universe
I would choose to be in the water.
Not as a heron- with my life
Rushing past me as toes grip
The mud, which hides crayfish.
Nor even as a brook trout does
Always reaching for the headwaters
Of my life’s flowing ambitions, but-
Instead, I’d choose to be a pebble,
Letting my edges be softened
By the beauty that moves me.
Dannay, Autumn. “Pebbles on the Riverbed.” The Crucible, Lock Haven University, 2018, p. 10.
Practicing
Writing each day, like this
is harder than I thought.
I want to be perfect, to
spill truth from every click
of my aging keyboard.
Accepting plain words,
simple rhyme, and cliché,
is difficult when I want to be
illuminating.
The things I say to be seen
as pure art, truths from the
natural world: nobody knows.
I’m out of practice.
More thought than actual
work moving fingers to dance
across the keyboard, to
inscribe the little knowledge I’ve
collected into a poem.
Wild Thing
Eyes closed.
Cool breezes wash over me,
songs of mourning doves float
past driftwood and old stone.
Earth smells deep, rank of
fish guts and decaying weeds.
Which is Spring, leading
to flourishing mayflies for the
trout that live in the hollow.
Eyes open.
Soft blue sky stretches wide
touching the mountains’ crests-
an arc of silk that the heron
will cross to nest at the cove.
The water reflecting his feathers
which are grey, the color of
my sister’s eyes, pure in its
tone while mine are
the clay under my feet,
waiting to be shaped.
gathering swallows 