They paddle with staccato feet
In powder-pools of sunlight,
Small blue busybodies
Strutting like fat gentlemen
With hands clasped
Under their swallowtail coats;
And, as they stump about,
Their heads like tiny hammers
Tap at imaginary nails
In non-existent walls.
......
When I was a windy boy and a bit
And the black spit of the chapel fold,
(Sighed the old ram rod, dying of women),
I tiptoed shy in the gooseberry wood,
The rude owl cried like a tell-tale tit,
I skipped in a blush as the big girls rolled
Nine-pin down on donkey's common,
And on seesaw sunday nights I wooed
Whoever I would with my wicked eyes,
The whole of the moon I could love and leave
......
Tsss
Summer sounds,
Tsss
Concrete and heat,
Sneakered feet on tar,
Stepping on a melted candy bar,
Squish
Crunch, crunch
Gravel on the street,
Woosh
......
There was a whispering in my hearth,
A sigh of the coal.
Grown wistful of a former earth
It might recall.
I listened for a tale of leaves
And smothered ferns,
Frond-forests; and the low, sly lives
Before the fawns.
......
And now another autumn morning finds me
With chalk dust on my sleeve and in my breath,
Preoccupied with vague, habitual speculation
On the huge inevitability of death.
Not wholly wretched, yet knowing absolutely
That I shall never reacquaint myself with joy,
I sniff the smell of ink and chalk and my mortality
And think of when I rolled, a gormless boy,
......
In many shades of floral, flawless beauty
their variant scents, sometimes fruity.
Swaying in sunbeams, joy flows
Solo dance, wind blows.
Heart-stopping
Rose
Smile dropping
Garden beauty pose
in lazy heat's daydream throes.
Bringing luxury to days, duly
......
stately tall and green
lofty trees touch turquoise sky
curved path in between
silky breeze caress
summer's on a redbird high
clouds join sunshine guild
profusion perfumes
flowers color Wednesday hours
......
Barefoot in luxuriant grass, luscious, pearl moonlight falling down,
In the golden season of sensual thrills, in the hours without sound,
Underneath the tempting tangerine tree, eating of its fragrant fruit,
With the stars dancing to tomorrow, by enigmatic, invisible routes.
Barefoot in peaceful dreamland, caressed softly by romantic moon,
When the ebony world lies in waiting, for the yellow canary's tune,
Barefoot in tangy tangerines, in the warm, soft, wandering breezes,
In the darkest hours of sleepless night, when it seems time ceases.
Ebony shadows on the ground, a torrid afternoon,
Butterflies in the luscious roses, pinks on orange,
Swift flight of clamorous crows, black on sapphire,
Off toward hued sunset, that sets the world on fire,
Mystical mountain meadows, wildflowers in mists,
With the bright future ahead, of still, golden spells,
Clouds on lustrous dawn skies, in sunrise lavender,
Varying the vibrant color by the hours, in summer.
Flowers have gone wild
in the excess of sunshine
climbing homes and trees.
They poke through cracks in sidewalks
In verdancy of summer.
Golden sun gleamimg
colored blooms at my back door
woods and fields teeming.
Rose gardens are overgrown
......