Poetry

I write poetry primarily ( I just started writing flash fiction which is harder for me). I've been writing more than forty years. I love words and what they can do. I learn from what I write. It is an ongoing process, I revise, sometimes for decades, until I feel I have found the best and fewest words. I believe poetry comes close to saying in words what can't be said in words. Mary Oliver is my favorite contemporary poet.

Sunset
Before slipping
into a waiting sea
the red sun
for just a moment
stops, perhaps
imagining the feel
of cool water.
Who's To Say
In the forest
a dying mushroom curls
in on itself, appearing
as a new bloom.
Who’s to say,
end or beginning.
Silk Sari
Washed in the river
and hung on a tree
her silk sari sings
to the mud
of the sadness of drying
Tundra Swans
Swans to the far horizons
thousands and thousands
fresh from the Tundra.
White feathers cover
their long necks
and great bodies
in dazzling grandeur.
They fill the landscape and cover the lake,
more of them than my mind can measure.
I stand and stare staggered by
their immense numbers.
In Audubon's time
such bird abundance was commonplace
and bird scarcity wasn't yet a concept.
Baroque Concert
Lips on reed,
fingers on keys,
stringed wood
cradled close.
Breath pushes
slowly through oboe,
bow races then slows
across receptive strands,
each angle discrete.

Wind and fingers swirl
alive a charmed sound
to woo the Gods of peace
back to earth.