Island In a Lake

Every morning... every evening, he feels like an island in a lake, a deep lake glistening in lithesome ripples. His cranky old face sees an illuminated white lotus, withering in shades of shaggy eyebrows and wrinkled hands. The sylvan lake in his eyes still whittle reeds on soft soil, in hopes of crackling sounds of laughter, from a nearby stream. Ants, grasshoppers, birds, squirrels haunt the silent solitary lake. A look at his picturesque daughter on wall, like a scintillating princess, his moon shines on a crystalline lake. Reminiscing a passionate journey from mountain archways, parching thirsty birds and deers, a stream had once bubbled in life through boulders. Now a placid cold lake at peace, so much like death. Nothing new happens in his dreams, locked in regrets. Bereft of love, food interludes sleep in his lonely days. Brown and golden leaves strewn on the lake. Is this the last autumn that his eyes will see? Like invisible stars in daylight, he sees white quills of a swan floating on the lake. Memory fails a weak body, he can hear faint songs of a swan in the blue lake. A pink sunrise and peach sunset reflects the horizon, mirror images in dusk and dawn. He feels like an island in the lake. Every evening....every morning.. Dated 24th, March 2019 Julia Ward's Intensity Poetry contest