Thoughts keep coming back
of late afternoons
with the dark wings
of currawongs weaving
pathways through the high
branches leaving long threads
of song draped across trees -
the drifting skeins
of woodsmoke from winter fires
burning in cozy rooms,
eyes fixed in hypnotic stares
on dancing flames and minds
meandering the past, some
about to fall asleep.
Thoughts keep coming back
of snow falling silently
in feathery flakes
outside the window
and in the distance, an owl's
plaintive call going unanswered
in the thick air.
I listen to the sound of the fire,
a ticking wall clock,
breathings from beneath
a folded quiet and the drip
of melt water from somewhere
in the dark. I would like to stay
here but the fire is dying out
and its glowing embers
are nearly spent. A chill
is seeping through the cracks
opening between the past
and the present.
Categories:
currawongs, memory, time, winter,
Form: Free verse
I hear currawongs threading
their melodic calls through
the trees, sewing a dark
into the cold air.
And far below,
a flock of white cockatoos
screech their noisy chaos
along the deepening shadows
of the valley floor.
They seem like dabs
of zinc white escaping
from a painting, sprouting
wings to lift them
from the canvas
and fly them to where
they flicker on the edge
of the unseen,
before dissolving forever
into the distances
of blue ultramarine.
Categories:
currawongs, art, bird, blue, color,
Form: Free verse
Traffic is slow.
In the drizzle
the holiday crowd complain and grizzle.
Magpies and currawongs are carolling.
The morning is silvery now.
A heavy sky bends down,
dropping diamonds
wetly on the ground.
Mounds and hills will grow emerald grasses.
Rain sings the treasure of life as it passes.
Categories:
currawongs, rain,
Form: Personification
They sing best
just before dark
when a chill
gathers and begins
to settle the shadows,
currawongs
trailing their laments
in long ribbons
of sound
high in treetops,
then off out of ear,
unfinished,
leaving longed for notes
unheard and silence
expanding into spaces
where the end
should be.
Categories:
currawongs, bird, leaving, song,
Form: Free verse
I am dreaming of you tonight,
though we may never meet
but if we do, you will know me
by my hyacinth shoes.
You will remember me in the pale blooms
that float on
billabongs or ponds
I will take you along dusty streets
an outback town, where currawongs
call at dusk from scraggly gums,
branches rocking in the wind
I will whisper secrets
of morning glory vines along a back fence-
of the surprise that Spring's
first snowdrop brings
it’s green petals
dotted and lined with delicate green.
Your sorrow will never be the color of them
your joy only as high
as the elation they bring
I will teach you to sing by slow caresses,
my hair on your skin
to dance with soft words that waltz
over a carpets of leaves
No-one will know the small cues - each tiny gesture
that will guide us
into life’s un-knowable purpose.
Suzanne Delaney
Categories:
currawongs, dream, fantasy, hope, imagery,
Form: Free verse