Thursday, May 31, 2007

Thursday Poem: Summer Night

The night is so long, its pages so slow.
Who can read it?
Who can guess the final chapter,
or the afterword?

Moonlight is another story, of lovers mostly.
And starlight still another, of the heaven
we hope for in the haze of the heavens.

And there are little musics, sometimes,
as though the mockingbird, also, can't sleep.

If I step outside
I smell the grass, or the rain.
Or that purse of honey, another one awake—

the blue iris, so straight, so sweet-lipped.
Soft and alone in the dark.

Mary Oliver, Summer Night
(from
Long Life)

3 comments:

Suzie Ridler said...

What a stunning photo of that iris! I love it and it works so well with the poem.

Rowan said...

A lovely poem - so descriptive of a perfect summer night. Not that we have had many so far this year! I love iris of all kinds, the one in your photograph is a such a wonderful rich colour.

Tabor said...

Since Iris are one of my favorites flowers I could not take my eyes off the photo. How did you capture such depth of hue and tone?