Orange light streams in
And the floor dances with fire
Meanwhile, in the sky
Pink translucent clouds are shaded
By billowing plumes of smoke
Ash covers the sidewalks
Children play with it
Like they would a puddle
Watched over by a flaming copper sun
Why is it so beautiful
When the world is on fire?
Cotton candy skies
Sweep over hard machinery
Gray to contrast pink
Spun sugar clouds
Sun bleached and fractured with gold
Hang amidst black plumes
Of industrialization
Wind slinks on the ground
It’s unseasonably cold
May should be bright, warm
Full of buds and flowers
Not this bleak, cold, gray howler
Is it climate change?
Perhaps.
Or maybe the weather
Is a reflection of my own mood.
My car climbs the road
To find a spot over the trees
And all the houses
Just to catch a glimpse
Of fraying clouds burnished gold
Slashed over mountains
A sunset, bright and bleeding
It’s a reminder
Things that might seem torn
Or damaged or shredded
Are still achingly beautiful
A bruised sky looming
Black tinged and brushed with purple
Pink blossoms stare up
Incandescent
Mouths open, waiting for rain
The sky takes a breath
And the bruise darkens
Droplets slip down the window
Tracing tears on the glass
Angry, the clouds harden
Tears change to sideways torrents
Drowning the flowers
I stare up
Green trees haloed by a cornflower sky
The bristles of their green brush
Sway back and forth, propelled by the wind
The tree tips are haloed by a brightness
It casts a relief about them, outlining and softening their coarse edges
That Aura I see is a trick of the eye and the light.
And probably has some fancy name.
Like Ocular pigmentation.
But to me, here in the wilderness.
It’s magic.
Crawling into work
The sky stretching over me
Blue and crisp and cold
Bathing the mountains
In its icy teal beauty
It’s mundanity
Makes it all more beautiful
But…I creep inside
Spring is so fickle
Last week she stretched her arms, yawning
We were in her glow
Yet this week she left
Crawling under a blanket of snow
Underground with Hades
Everything’s Rising.
Coastal waters are rising
Taxes are rising
Inflation…rising
My age is rising too, but
That’s not your problem
But, it has been said
With every action comes an
Equal reaction
If everything is rising…
Will we rise as a community?
Or, will we all fall?
By which I mean fail
To acknowledge hard truths
and take action?
Snow brings the trouble
The kids smell change in the air
Their noses upturned
Minds whirring with plots
It begins innocently
A white rush of air
A splash of cold snow
Suddenly, it’s a frenzy
Mounds crisscross the yard
Showering the kids
All with red noses and smiles
Hands cold and frozen
Rejoicing in the weather
Until the adults swarm in
To end the melee
Hipstory 