Based on For All by Gary Snyder, write about a place you hold dear. Gary wrote about Turtle Island--North America's original name--and more specific, the Rockies. To add challenge, try to use short/deliberate lines to capture the memory and make every line a shot from a camera. This is inspired by the lines such as, "cold nose dripping," and, "stones turn underfoot, small and hard as toes." The story does not need to be true, but the place does.
-Tennessee Backyard
Red clay turns into green grass.
Brothers race towards the water.
The younger one jumps in last.
They are watched by their mother.
Malinois chew on wild onion.
Later, the brothers join them
Before climbing a white oak.
Their father prepares his boat.
The river his caller, off goes father
In his truck. The boys watch a buck
From their oak tree. Breezy Sunday
Joy for all. The father shan't be long.
Neighborhood Trail
ReplyDeleteDown your street and to the left
Down the steep and up the hefty
Hill of chewed and spit bark,
Mulch recycled from a tree's park.
Speed down and through two houses
Splitting the sidewalk before the dowses,
Initials etched for the spouses.
Look and watch for teenage louses.
Sidestep down the hill
Like the ice is imaginary.
Do not run to get your fill;
The corner beckons for the wary.
Turn left and start straight.
Leading to a bridge's gate,
This is your figure eight.
Turn back now or test your fate.
I urge progress to the next half
As it holds perfect a photograph.
Discover the another 'hood parallel to yours,
But beware of the barks; they're outdoors!
- Your Friendly Neighborhood PanLibDem
Strawberry Hill
ReplyDeleteYou can't smell the bay from here.
Tech-startup hipsters on benches
commune with unsettled geese.
Trees rise from the crispened lake
like a pile of autumn leaves, blown
by unexpected California cold.
Someone is playing bongo drums.
There are dogs off their leashes
sniffing out new hiking trails.
I scale the island in minutes.
Someone has planted patches
of mysterious, flowerless plants.
Around the curve of the hill
like the curve of the earth
a waterfall traces smoothly.
At the bottom, flat stones
a mosaic sealed with water.
Two mallards hold their peace.
I sit at the bottom, looking up.