Thursday, May 27, 2010

Thursday Poem - Happiness

---She loves West Tenth Street on an
ordinary summer morning.
Michael Cunningham, The Hours

And I love this ordinary summer afternoon,
sitting under my cherry tree full of overripe fruit,
too much for us to pick, an abbonanza of a tree,
I love this dark grey catbird singing its awkward song,
and the charcoal clouds promising rain they don't deliver.
I love the poem I've been trying to write for months,
but can't; I love the way it's going nowhere at all.
I love the dried grass that crackles when you walk on it,
leached of color, its own kind of fire.
Way off in the hedgerow, the musical olio of dozens of birds,
each singing its own song, each beating its own measure.
This is all there is: the red cherries, the green leaves,
sky like a pale silk dress, and the rise and fall
of the sweet breeze. Sometimes, just what you have
manages to be enough.

Barbara Crooker

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yes, it is enough sometimes. Just looking through my window at the green leaves of trees this verdant spring.

the wild magnolia said...

Simply beautiful and managing to be enough!

I love this poem!

Valerie said...

Lovely! More midsummer in that poem than I'm ready for...but there is more midsummer in these high 80's F. temperatures than I'm ready for as well.

Bonnie said...

I have to agree with Lilian, "yes, it is enough sometimes." If only . . . if only we could all could experience a special moment in time such as this.

Your photo is absolutely lovely, as always.

One Woman's Journey - a journal being written from Woodhaven - her cottage in the woods. said...

Sky like a pale silk dress.
Computer problems and just busy with other matters - have kept me away for awhile.
You never disappoint.
When I read your words and look at your beautiful images - I feel as though I have come home!!

Sky said...

we have an almost duplicate of this photo! so lovely, and one of my husband's favorite spring flowers.