The harbingers of hesitation
Slow with time’s tenacity
Stifle the urge to grasp the moment
Shorten the length of memory’s grasp
Weaken the touch of today’s meaning
Soft raindrops unfelt on leathered skin
Sunshine hints at a forgotten warmth
That fevered longing for a faded shadow
A dream held in the cooling darkness
The lunar ice cloud draws but a silent shiver
Etched into the edge of a frozen moment
Its stars the un-melted tears of lover’s longings
romantic robins
swiftly sway in sweet refrains ~
worlds spring from the void
long stretched-out nights shrink
icicles melt drip by drip...
wild geese honk in flight
pushing through the snow
shoots rise up toward the sun...
crocuses sprouting
green dapples the trees
winter slowly slips away...
short days grow longer
a change in seasons
life gets rejuvenated...
color’s replenished
harbingers of spring...
songbirds sweetly sing
robin zugunruhe
migratory restlessness—
singing their way north
Robin Image credit: Michael Lamarche
Graphic image by Mark Toney using Canva Pro
“Robins are feeling restless. Ornithologists call this pre-migratory restlessness, zugunruhe. This German word comes from zug (move, migration) and unruhe (anxiety, restlessness).” — Journey North (American Robin) - journeynorth.org/robin/spring2017/robin-migration022217.html
Snow melting, icicles dripping from the eave
Hint that winter’s frigid air may soon leave,
Replaced by warm breezes from the south
In swampy bayous return the cottonmouth.
When mulberry buds are ready to burst
Buttercups turn upward like they thirst,
My lawn will glow with sweet dandelions
In nature the colors change like chameleons,
Spring flowers present as a lovely bouquet
While the hibernating animals come to play.
The meadowland beckons me for a stroll
And a newness of spirit refreshes my soul.
written January 19, 2022
submitted to "A STRAND" Poetry Contest
sponsored by Brian Strand
HARBINGERS OF SNOW
A cacophony of Chickadees arise out of the thicket,
In undulating patterns,
Swooping low, above the barrier picket.
Across the meadows vast expanse,
Gliding on the wily whim of winter,
Fluttering wings perform an aerial dance.
Reveling in the crisp indigo sky
The mighty north wind begins to blow;
On unfurled wings, with one last swoop, away they fly.
revised on May 8, 2022
HARBINGERS OF MORNING
Seam-splitting the rim of an eastern sky,
morning's radiant golds
grading
down the rimpled brow of mountains
leapfrogs
out of the high hilled horizon
with the sun
come upon the winged
molecules of birds
sun-stirred from their trees.
Advancing
under a sun-burst sky
to undulations of flight,
these verbs, in action
swoop down
the white steepled streets
loping in sunlight
to gather
amid the eaves of a still sleeping town
and resound
as bells
under a bandshell of sky---
this motion of birds
breaking rank
into the melee of morning.
Harbingers of Hollow
In my habitual haunting hysteria
I digress to an abandoned area
Voids of dimming dissolving glow
The hermetic harbingers of hollow
Landscapes of secluded shadow
In cathedrals of cacophony grow
A salient soul spiritually spiraled
Within perpetual rags apparelled
My ambient apocalypse of night
Demons joy to my severed sight
Within my chaotic baneful bliss
The kaleidoscope of love I miss
Lost within my secluded shadows
Sleepless in my cumbrous clothes
Living the life of non-existence
Into the path of least resistance.
First submitted Sept.07.2017
Richie Sambora When a blind man cries
June.12.2018
Hollow
Sponsored by: Anthony Slausen
Who will be the harbinger of a new order
Who will see the signals and the approaching vision
That lifts up our humanity and starts it evolving
That unifies and breaks down boundaries
And ends all man made divisions
Never have people craved so much
To place themselves inside a box
To label themselves, to explain themselves
To seek an identity that's external
Then trying to define this action as having discovered what's internal
And for a short while they play act this role for all else to see
But the destiny that manifests you see
Is growing awareness and being existentially free
In this we find truth in ourselves
As spiritually conscious human beings
And this gives us all the ability to become harbingers of light
And see the new order coming and an end to the illusory might
We will cast aside distractions and focus just simply on love
And live a life of inner peace and knowing that this living is enough.
Harbingers of Hollow
In my habitual haunting hysteria
I digress to an abandoned area
Voids of dimming dissolving glow
The hermetic harbingers of hollow
Landscapes of secluded shadow
In cathedrals of cacophony grow
A salient soul spiritually spiraled
Within perpetual rags apparelled
My ambient apocalypse of night
Demons joy to my severed sight
Within my chaotic baneful bliss
The kaleidoscope of love I miss.
USE THESE 8 WORDS 1. HYSTERIA 2. KALEIDOSCOPE 3. PERPETUAL 4. CHAOTIC5. CACOPHONY 6. APOCALYPSE 7. SPIRALED 8. HOLLOW
Sept.07.2017
Eight-word challenge
Sponsored by: John Hamilton
Surmised, assumed
Foreboding shadows brood
Like omens without mediums
Their strange impressions loom
Blind they seem
Gloating as they gleam
Rippling, murmuring
Stifling a scream
On the brink of speech
Their mutterings recede
Occupied by the thoughts
Of the lost and in between
Conceit or dream
Mythic or obscene
They coddle with a moonlit bribe
Confiding the unseen
Written by © Raven Drake
Echoes of Spring from the streets,
Laughter and shouting greets
My ear, in a jubilant noise:
Raucous, wild neighbor boys.
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