Love Poem For a Place and a Girl

photo by Allison Tardio

She understands this place;

she understands me.

We walk the wooden boards in silence

and let Nature speak.

The creek eases past Cypress knees,

anchoring trees who have stood

peaceful witness

through lifetimes come and gone.

"Look," she says. "The paw paws are nearly ripe."

I inhale their tropical musk 

and reach for her hand.

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Fireblossom Fridays, Lights, Camera, Love!

The Zen of Strawberries

image source

She goes to the strawberry fields to be free
Head down   back bent   hot sun   sandy soil
Toenails painted in bright sloppy berry juice
The world is bright red candy on green vines
And hers to put in a bucket

Playing hide and seek with the berries
Searching for the reddest  ripest 
Look! Here's one meant for a magazine cover shot!
And here's one so big it looks pregnant!
This one looks like a drunk's nose!
And these are conjoined twins!

She picks more berries than she can ever eat
Or make into pies or jam
But the picking's the thing
She tells herself that when she has a daughter
She will bring her to the strawberry fields
And she does
But her daughter just complains
Of the heat and the bees
Perhaps she is just too young to understand
The beauty of an afternoon
Free

submitted for Thursday Think Tank 55, Freedom, at Poets United

London Daydream

image courtesy of James Rainsford

Touchdown at Heathrow

London love affair is born

Oxford aspirations

West End wishes

Topped with chocolate sponge pudding

 Her rural southern roots

Confine her

Like a prisoner in a tower

She dreams of escaping Underground

To emerge speaking the Queen's English

"Stop"? 

Oh no. She's just beginning.

submitted for One Shoot Sunday at One Stop Poetry
also for Poetry Potluck-Favorite Things