POETRY BLOG

There's something appealing about a cycle of poems that revolves like the year common and yet never to appear this way again.

WINTER: the winds power and the chill as you struggle awake; the still city before thunder breaks; engorging of the stream. The broken black clouds of a distant storm. The Fire: building the fire and the conversations about the fire. Howl of the pounding rain. Slam of surf along the coast. Bare trees. The withdrawal from winter and seeking of warmth. The science of weather; the relation between ocean, land, sun, earth rotation et al; low ebbing energy- death; the black cape; the wide brimmed hat. Rushing around in the city in the rain. The smell of warm bodies in a train car. The long wait for nature to burst out in reds and oranges.

Winter is when the arguments take place.

SPRING: Baseball begins again; reawakening of the senses out of dark winter night. Germination of the seed. Warm breezes in the waiting. Spring showers as the bus approaches. Love budding. Boats huffing along the Bay. Light and lively music from the park. The last snows melt into the little streams. Flowers bloom. The planting. The bee in the garden or sucking from the hanging plant on the patio. Kites on the greensward as the bay glides behind.

SUMMER: The heat, lawd de heat; to plunge into the cool lake or pond. Heat that rizzes from the hood of the car. In the bleachers drinking beer, crowds on ocean beaches. Laughter at dusk from the deck. Wandering through the city of loud conversations. Sleeping nude on top of the bed. Valley heat. The opening of the hydrant for the poor kids; raging fires in the forests. The sun. We don't know why it saves us but it often does. Hiking into the mountains where the heat has lodged in the lungs. A hawk flies lazily overhead; school's out and the kid is looking for adventure. The vengenance of the heat of Indian Summer.

AUTUMN: Cooling of the breeze. The leaves scattered on the little road while walking toward the stadium. Thanksgiving. The first rains after parched summer. Election season. The air chilled. It withers into winter. Harvest and its moon; the moon replaces the sun.