The leaf caught my eye-
began moving with no breeze!
Oh Katydid-
by God's magic, you survive!
Insects are terrific at camouflage
Many blend into bushes and trees
Leaf katydid doesn’t move or dodge
Lying still during autumn breeze
With her oranges yellows and bits of green
Leaf katydid is almost rarely seen
Lying on a leaf that matches her exactly
Being still, unmoving, most compactly
Unusual insect facts are fun to know
Creatures with long feelers use the night
Short feeler insects have better sight
Antennas sense enemies around and below
Cicada, dragonflies and honey bees
Have delicate feelers, but their eyes are good
Katydid, crickets and ants in the wood
Have long antennas, length of all degrees
Unusual insect facts, unknown to me until today
But now I have created this poem with a hey, hey, hey
Dancing around without a feeler of any kind.
At least I have a poetic heart and an artistic mind.
Written: March 09, 2024 For Charlotte Puddifoot Contest
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
with serendipitous moans—ocean lulls
It's russet embers
ignite her soul's quilled longings
she flies to bloomy sky-scape
last sigh of waning twilight
chirpy mirth—katydid sounds
waves of
soft silk canzone
to whispering crimson
of ephemeral serenade
waves of arid shadows— ebb in
blurring haze of lingering longing
besotted in spumy scatters sighing
In epicede of hushed Elysian quiddity
quixotic susurrus—shorebirds' sapidity
horizon in cinereous ululation of Peacocks
rainbows and sylphlike threnody
my heart too, mirths... waiting
for you to return to me—in spring
renascent wings wings of crimson
gold and plums of purples!
Written: November 28, 2023
______________________________________
Beneath the sweltering luminescent sky.
A thunderbolt flared over the silent firefly.
Oak-smoke tones and vanilla bean paste.
Swung idly, draped as moss from a baste.
Tintinnabulation caused by wind-borne sighs.
The gentle quiet of flora roughness is dry.
Evenfall cobalt-wrapped nascent starlight.
A crescent-shaped moon is gloaming in flight.
An avalanche of a billion Katydid wing beats
Cricket voices in a range of alto to bass feats
My gem-encrusted flame bursts and spits.
Beneath a benumbed bowl, boiling hiss.
My soul finds solace in the lichened death fall.
I was thrilled by the fire and the creepy owl call.
A soft mist falls across drooping eyelids.
amid the dancing stars and firefly skids.
In the semblance of my darkest
side lie the sunlight after me,
In the dark blue face was a
smile that only a select few could see.
Only a few that fishes
like me when we see the snakefish
Maybe a glowworm or two in
my wake, still, I am onto Kinyeti's peak
as a sad Giant long-legged katydid recasting into a camel to save thy naught, yes thy naught
Though I thought Weddell was
a sea of stars, I was at the end a
Beluga Whale grinding Lulo Rose's diamond
Morrow, morrow, morrow
mermaid promise keeps me going
to the seaside, scary you, scary we
She turned me into a jellyfish.
She put death onto the ghost that heist
me off my kiss, Oh my lips, it is blood
at night, lips in the light, a waterless smile
in the twilight
Semblance Dark, a death oath for a hairy head, a death oath for shaving even one middle-of-the-head hair. Scary ghost, scary clown
Struggling for my stolen heart, stolen heart
hid in the middle of the Cretaceous.
Happiness, for gumiho
O gumiho, stop taking them, I know
thy idea. I offer you Gum, yes O Gum
Tears and tears for the darkness
Sleep and sleep in the glow
It is for the duck of thy dark side, my
dark side, their dark side.
The warm hour after sunset in summer
Has long passed
So fast from these trees
In between
Just before the first freeze
Katydid clicks with half her strength
In the not-quite-right October sunshine
Violin swaddled to knee
Easy to miss her music
In the cold roar of autumn wind
Yet the surprise mercy of sun awakens her
If anyone notices
And from the Katydid’s mezzanine
With all she can muster
She calls to the universe a plea for more life
I think she is saying
Can you ever need something that does not exist?
Songbirds are singing,
voices are ringing,
morning arrives in the vale.
Hummingbirds humming,
woodpeckers drumming:
everything hearty and hale!
Throughout the forest:
katydid chorus;
Barn owl has something to say.
Crickets are chirping,
bullfrogs are burping,
glorious end to the day.
----------
The Alouette again: 5a/5a/7b/5c/5c/7b, two stanza minimum
Oh, that music from the movie,
so impassions me!
That haunting violin, with its moving
virtuosity.
Notes fill the air of man's most craven
inhumanity to man.
The reminder that it can indeed, verily
happen again.
One man, Schindler, saved so many
precious Jewish lives.
Some to this very day, because of him
generations still do thrive.
Would you stand up for your fellow man,
as he once did?
Or are you a selfish sort who seeks his own glory,
with the miniscule heart of a katydid?
January 11, 2020
7:45 PM PST
She is the music to my ears;
An impetus behind my cheers;
She jubilantly sings dawn jingles,
along with bird friends in the jungle.
She perforates the bamboo stems
and forges the eternal music gems;
Disguising herself as katydid and cricket,
She gleefully sings songs even in the night.
She is the rhythm of my life,
who is always there to ruin the strife;
she is the happy tune of my song
which makes me mentally strong
Yeah, she is the music to my ears
who certainly obliterates my fears and tears
Feb-11-2019
The katydid clings to my chair
Utters not a noise
A golden sun peeks from beyond
Through gray clouds only choice
The white illumination shines
Gives a glow under clouds
As fog settles in the hollow
Making a coolness proud
Wonderful time of solitude
Quiet before a storm
Noises of humanity begin
And a new day is born
Cadence calls collective clans
ricochet playful katydid
not crackle his crocodile skin.
Crazy kids combine their fares
for riding rickety RinTinTins
out zipping their yipping files.
Corny crackers crash their lines
lickety slippery splat
finishing race far much too soon
before fine ladies grow fat.
Cadence cries corrective crams
flippety flying frying fins
falling their crowns upside down
while mothers cry for their sins.
The refrain of the little birds
Breaks silence of the night
Hours of bleakness is dispelled
As on the horizon, the sun gives light
The vivid green, soon gives way
To a golden yellow leaf
Just another reminder of autumn
To hot summer days, it gives relief
The lonesome sound of the katydid
Ushers autumn to our door
Magnificent colors will appear
Painting beauty from mountain to shore
Cycles, - appear in so many ways
Various similitudes they enumerate
The brevity of life is brought into view
As on this fact, we meditate
Mankind is but a vapor or a flower
God's Word gives this metaphor
We're here today and gone tomorrow
Death is a stalking predator
The picture is not one of gloom
To those who have heeded His call
A new beginning it affords
Eternity ends the cycle for us all
Colan L Hiatt = 08-01-15
© All Rights Reserved
A katydid stopped at my door.
Wedge of green gossamer
But something more.
I angled to get a closer look.
Intrusive I fear was I.
He quickly me forsook.
Off to call at another door
Winged wisp of wonder
On a neighborly autumn tour.
a frog and a mouse
went for a ride
went along side by side
down the road they rode to see
until they got to the big oak tree
sat in the shade
all day they did
until they met a new katydid
a frog and a mouse went for a ride
joined by a katydid who rode by their side
sang to a tune the katydid knew
out of the trees the birds flew
no one seemed to really understand
the friendship of this merry band
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