Miscellaneous Sequence

Did the winter wind
Lift your smoke upward?
This hazy, hazy moon--
Across the withered field, nothing...
Nothing, not even moonlight.

A cold wave crashes
Against an unmoving boulder--
This stinging spray;
Even ice locking all in place
Could not hold your spirit.

From the tip
Of the melting icicle,
Flowing drops;
Winter wind always changes
The shape of this earthly life.

On a fence post,
The mourning dove huddles,
A solitary shape--
Snow settles on a worn coat
And stings the wrinkled face.

Heavy rain
Falls this New Year's Day
In passing--
The rushing brook leaves last year's
Silt settling in a crevice.

Another birthday;
Trying not to notice
The sprouting gray hair--
Freezing rain locks the seed
To the milkweed's splitting pod.

Contemplating
The spiritual afterlife;
This understanding--
Sparrow's tracks in snow
Vanish in shifting winds.

Winter plumage--
Young gold finches twitter
Into the cold wind;
The falling snow rolls off
Their darkened wing feathers.

Trying to thread
The eye of the quilt needle--
A cold draft;
Yellowed pine needles
Under the Christmas tree.

A tangled knot;
Regretting having to break
This thread--
A streak of pink
In winter's twilight sky.

Donna Ferrell -- 2003