In the cool, damp breeze of early dawn,
the courtyard lay silent, as if asleep.
Suddenly, the fallen jasmine blossoms smiled softly and said—
“Why have you left me lying on the ground like this?”
The courtyard breathed in silence and replied—
“You were once a star of the sky,
a dream that spread fragrance in the darkness of night.
I am only your final shelter.”
The blossoms said in a shy tone—
“Final?
Does everything that ends still carry such sweet fragrance?”
The courtyard smiled faintly,
as the morning light fell gently along the walls—
“Fallen flowers are the most beloved.
When they are on the tree, people only look at them,
but when they fall to the ground, the heart feels them.”
A soft, moist breeze arrived
and made the jasmine petals tremble.
They asked again—
“Then am I lost?”
The courtyard replied with tenderness—
“No, you are memory.
The childhood hidden in a mother’s lap,
the morning of prayers,
and the fragrance of someone’s silent love.”
Then both fell into silence.
Only the morning sun
gently kissed the fallen jasmine blossoms,
and the courtyard opened its heart
to embrace that lingering fragrance.
Yellow stucco-walled, for house;
That in front warm-paved.
Brightly blazing, pot on pot
Here and there seed-saved.
Of Summer, what is gazed through
In its setting's lace
Can but, in feminizing
Enhance, dear, your face.
Early in the summer
my classmates and I gathered outside
for a rededication ceremony.
A priest blessed a new bench
and we promised we would
find and replace a memorial stone
while
a younger class
who embraced their youth
shouted and laughed
running in and out
of the high school—
theirs for the weekend.
In my home's backyard,
There's a courtyard bloom,
Nature's beauty's room,
A summer's delight,
Basking in its warmth,
Held by hue and light.
August 20, 2023.
No. 4
Somewhere far away when the day retires
The dusk sneaks up, shyly like a bride
In the courtyard of my thoughts
Someone lights up lamps of my dreams
And yet without reason my breath becomes heavy
My eyes well up just sitting with my thoughts
As tears flow and light a spark, travelling
Right across the dark, torching the sky at dawn
Such is my heart as lifetime of connections emerge
This heart of mine knows all these deep secrets
Even their shadows cannot be separated
And these dreams are mine and mine alone!
22.5.2021
Sponsor: Brian Strand
Contest: All yours May 23
First Place
I have seen you at the courtyard door,
Your hair aglow with summer spark,
Your bright blue eyes scanning the skies
For your sister soul, the meadowlark
I have seen you at the courtyard door
Searching the wind bent cherry bough,
Picking the first of its bright red fruit
So you might sweetness add sweetness to
I have seen you at the courtyard door,
Weighed by some unnamed sorrow,
Your face unfocused and hid by shade
Though yet the night your beauty borrowed
I have seen you at the courtyard door,
And loved you day and night beside,
And stood at my window, though hidden away,
And dreamed to make of you my bride
I have seen you at the courtyard door,
A final time from my perch above
For I saw you at the courtyard door
This morning with another love.
A banyan tree in my courtyard
That I had planted ten years ago
Looks beautiful with its large limbs
As if a beauty queen of monsoon
Were entering her adolescence
It smiles when gusts of cool wind
Touch it with adorable feelings
Droplets of rain seems curious
To entice it with intoxicating gestures
When banyan tree stretches
For soft touch of rain drops
I may feel its emotions
When my love touched me first time
In the college rose garden
And it was raining then
And today banyan tree of my courtyard
Seems matured enough
To repeat history of adolescence love
This amazing monsoon.
In the love courtyard of their life
Life and nature easily blend
blend silently and so softly
Softly yearn for one another.
Mohan Chutani
Contest: Four Lines Only by Nette Onclaud
Date: 8.6.2015
Visual 4
Walking as if within a dream down, her heart's hushed corridors....
A swarm of gnats gnawing viciously on their mongrel heretics dogmatic
Scrolls his provenance clinging unto it's birth this womb's, in vogue ? Void
Sacrilegious separatism these virulent breeds as bred by, rabid's father tongue
An ark of their own covenants; Elizabethan's, elliptical children studious starve'lings
Intransigent invading illusionist craving conjurers confederations; ancient's sperminations
Luxferre la fox her kismet's quaff a quagmire ? Yet love's looking glass and time, she shall drink.
In the moldering courtyard I linger awhile
Among ancient arches, in the old Spanish style
Revealed are sad stories...these etched stones hide
Ring out wild bells to the wild sky!
The marble fountain would murmur here
Above the doorway, vines withered and bare
Aloft from the tower, are the four watchful eyes
Ring out wild bells to the wild sky!
Three vestige bells hang overhead
Their voices silent, songs are long dead
Only the pigeons, with cooing cries
Ring out wild bells to the wild sky!
From the ruined walls so simply laid
Shadows of saints...moss covered jade
The weeping old willow, leaves crackled and dry
Ring out wild bells to the wild sky
Far from today, I will pass on through
This gate, this place brings peace anew
I drink with my ears and my glistened eyes
Ring out wild bells to the wild sky
The flowers still bloom and the overgrowth tells
The ancient tolling, of the song of the bells
When the rest of the world is passing by
Ring out wild bells to the wild sky!
The longing to know, is within my heart
Yet a peace I will find, when I finally depart
Tho' silent they have been, over graves that lie
Ring out wild bells to the wild sky!
Atrium garden
Five petal Azalea
Magenta blossoms
By Robb A. Kopp
Indian summer fall day
Glimmering sunshine filtering through the swaying leaves
Casting shadows upon the sidewalk
Looking out a window
A homeless man is observed
As he begins to use the courtyard as his stage
Loneliness
Brings about the need to have imaginary conversation with the pedestrians
A need to hear ones own voice
Scurrying pedestrians are too frightened
To use the courtyard as a gathering place
To share lunch with friends
He walks away
He turns and gives the sign of the cross as if to imitate a priest
Portraying a blessing upon the stone bench
Which he is known to sleep on
He carries with him, his meek possessions
Stuffed into a makeshift pouch
Headed to another park to spend time alone
Hearing the sounds of the city
The sound of the city police
Stating he must vacate the premises
The homeless walk with their heads down
TO prevent seeing the look of disgust
As the pedestrians whiz by
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