The Seasons

source

The flowers bloom then go to seed
The leaves turn brown and fall from trees
So all of Nature's children heed
the calling of the Seasons.

The frogs and turtles go to sleep
The squirrels hide acorns buried deep
so all of Nature's children keep
the rhythm of the Seasons.

But humans are a stranger breed
We oddly seem to have a need
Refusing to give in, concede
the cycle of the Seasons.

So stubbornly we do believe
That loss of youth is cause to grieve
And though we try, we can't deceive
the passage of the Seasons.


submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Sunday Mini Challenge, Salvatore Quasimodo

Cinquains For a Saturday

Change or Die

Hanging

On the door frame

Opaque chrysalis clings

Butterfly inside its tight skin

Black, dead

source

 In the Bush

Robins

Eating berries

Holly bushes rustle

Squawks and feathers fill the chill air

Dog barks

submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Weekend Mini Challenge, Cinquain

What's the Buzz?

photo by lolamouse (s. tardio)

Buzzing bees working

Covered in sun and pollen

Summer's harbingers

Nature's Music

source

Serenity surrender to restless ruminations

I return to the feral forest where rests make music's metre

Wooden sun bleached boards carry me through sighing Cypress

Moments and measures play longer by the cadence of the creek

Waterstriders wade like tiny persons paddling

Raucous red bellied woodpecker spies russet red tailed hawk

Bullfrogs burp; spring beauties blush. Senses soar like swallowtails.

submitted for Poetic Bloomings, In Form Poet, Alliterisen (Complex)

A Trio of Tanka

source

Snipping back dry sprigs

Dirt under my fingernails

Scent of rosemary

Winter's unruly blanket

Shelters spring's tidy green growth

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Great blue heron prints

Raccoon trails under boardwalk

Deer hooves pressed in mud

Hieroglyphics of the wild

What is lost in translation?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Tiny white flowers

Paint over winter's canvas

Pure as spring snowfall

Come summer, white becomes red

Innocence becomes passion

Submitted for Imaginary Garden With Real Toads, Format Challenge (Tanka)

Gray on Gray

image source

Lizard on a rock

Studies his shadow below

Shades of gray on gray

submitted for The Purple Treehouse, Poetic Forms, Haiku

Tree-o-let

photograph courtesy of Diana Lee

 Grace these boughs with rain and snow

Black winged angel of the wood

Sheltering the fawn and doe

Grace these boughs with rain and snow

Pine scented nests on earth below

Let doubters stand where Thoreau stood

Grace these boughs with rain and snow

Black winged angel of the wood.

submitted to Photograph Prose

Battle Creek Cypress Swamp

photo by Temari 2010

The trees are older than our cares

I walk beneath a cypress sky

I hear the barred owl's plaintive cry

And soon forget the day's affairs.

The birds and frogs sing joyful prayers

 The breeze breathes like a lover's sigh

The trees are older than our cares

I walk beneath a cypress sky.

I spy a young deer unawares

 The cypress watch us live and die

The creek keeps flowing by and by
Its secrets with the earth it shares

The trees are older than our cares.

submitted for: One Stop Poetry Form-Rondel

                     One Shot Wednesday-Week 38

                     Thursday Poets Rally

The Blind Owl

image from Few Miles, Haiku Challenge

So, it's Valentine's Day and Day 14 of the Haiku Challenge. The Challenge is to write at least one haiku each day on a theme or picture prompt posted on the website for the 28 days of February. I didn't discover this site until Day 11. To do penance for my tardiness, I have set myself the goal of catching up by writing the previous 10 haikus as quickly as possible. The first, here, need not have a theme.

This haiku is a tribute to a blind owl that resided at a local nature center where I volunteer teach. It was unable to survive in the wild and was cared for at the center. It died of old age last year.

image from Robert E. Barber

The blind owl is dead

Caged no more, it now flies free 
Hunts mice in heaven