A Little Scribble and an Honorable Mention

At flashy fiction, RJ Clarken asked, "what color are you?" I combined this with the largely blue mosaics of Isaiah Zagar as photographed by my very dear friend Daryl Edelstein at Real Toads mini-challenge, and here is the result, a humble little poem to have come from so many ingredients, but I hope you'll like it.

The second poem I wrote some weeks ago, and entered in a competition in which I am told it received honorable mention. Everyone's a winner, baby. At any rate, now I can post it here. The labels at the bottom are for the second poem.

"Thin Air"

I am gold
behind the cat's eyes.

I am silver
inside a drop of rain.

I am red
in the heart of a strawberry.

You can't see me
though I am right in front of your eyes.

I am blue...
blue...
as an empty sky.

___________  

"Offering For The Moon"

After the last time,
I said that I was done.

Lies had slept in the mouths of every lover I ever kissed,
And so I have leant lazy against silence, since--
Like a cat tail drowsing easy at lake side.

To give one's self, naked, to someone else
Is to lose one's balance,
And falling down the sharp shale wash
Is not flying--
I have become, now, more basin than bird.

Still,
We have known each other for a long time,
As each star knows both light and darkness.
The moon may be mad, but never lies,
And so, for you,
I trust;
For you,
I love;
For you, my heart offers itself
Beyond falling and beyond time.

________

Henna Tattoo

So these are the moon and stars I receive from you

My adored and true--

You whose love is not love,

But only vagary;

So these moon and stars are what's left of you,

And they'll hardly do--

Just a gorgeous and temporary

Henna tattoo.

____________

Winter Rose

Wild roses grew untended by the old churchyard wall

I would steal there by evening

And give names to them all

Their petals, to my hands, were soft as her face

And the moon, like your love, dear

Lent everything grace

There were angels of stone, the churchyard their keep

I would steal there alone

Just to sit silently

Their wings were of stone, and that's why they wept

And still like the angels

My vigil I kept

My mother lamented the loss of her child

While I, like the roses,

Untended grew wild

My love came too late to the old churchyard wall

Not I nor the angels

Can hear my love call

My love is an angel in form and in face

She weeps in the churchyard,

Our trysting place

The winter's white beauty can smother and kill

And I, like the churchyard,

Am silent and still.

________________

Morning Glory

See the vine, brittle and brown,

How december has changed this place!

The harsh winds unsettle and mar--

So recent the mornings I hurried down

The barefoot path to see your face!

A fool, I sighed, "how enchanting you are!"

___________________________________