Summer is gone (Sept 26 2010)

Summer is gone
This morning, as I jogged through cooler air
I could feel the tendrils of autumn
Nipping at my heels
A quick brush of my cheek
disguised as a cool wisp of breeze

Summer has gone
The grays and browns of autumn peer out
Slyly testing the water
Cautiously, once held at bay
Creeping in the cool shadows
By the direct rays of summer suns

Summer is done
Even the day flees the onslaught of the cold
Showing itself but sparingly
Night falls early
As the cosmos itself prepares
For Persephone’s decent

Summer is gone
And we huddle closer,
seeking The warmth of electric bonfire
And it’s creeping, evident
Green grasses rust to brown
Winds rattle leaves now gone golden

Summer is gone

The Runners

Either sissors of freckled white
or a windmill of ebony arms
churning
churning
the air into a thickened warm mass
machine like runners
young and perfect
leave others
younger, slower
behind in their wake of sweat and intensity

Glorious day for one, only one
Whose body, sculpted like young gods
has overcome time itself
ticking digitally against their effort
The followers
Those washed ashore by the victors wake
no less valiant in their Herculean effort

Pride
Pride follows effort
Pride follows those who strive
Not only those who wear the elusive victors crown

Courtly LOve

There she stands
Magnificent, yet unaware
of my yearning, my devotion

Silhouetted
Framed by a setting sun
graceful body, shadowed through her gown

Her skin, hair
beyond my description, imagination
of my poor powers of speech

Without knowing
she commands my feeble efforts
intended, hopeful, to fall within her gaze

In her name
I would dare deeds so bold
slaying dragons and armored foe

For her smile
I would risk my very life and limb
so no harm might befall hers

And even death
I would embrace most gladly
if that be the cost of her kiss

My Guinevere
destined am I to be a lonely knight
Not Arthur, nor bold Lancelot

For propriety
denies my hand the touch of skin
fate denies the warmth of caress

Here I stand
miserable in my devotion
presumptuous in my desire

There she stands
magnificent, yet unaware
of my sadness, of my pain

ashley's song

Sweet child of seven seas

She struggles toward the sunshine

Meanwhile fearful of the dark



So Much, so much

Of your life

Shadowed in gray clouds

Anxious to laugh

Anxious to love

But fearful of the tears

That are inevitable to all



Hesitant to acknowledge happiness

For fear that it,

Like the morning mists

Will dissipate

To be replaced by heavy clouds of sadness



You heard the mermaids singing

Each to each

“I do not think they will sing to me,”

You whispered

Wary of the sadness

That awaits you

Fearful of the joy

That might be fleeting



But, Listen…

They do sing for you

Time after time they call to you

A beacon, a lighthouse

Guiding you through choppy seas

Guiding you to sunlit shores and cloudless skies



I have heard the mermaids singing

Their song was meant for you

The rhythm of the waves

Beats a chorus to your name

The very universe

Sings out its song to you

A harmony of the spheres

An intergalactic tone

A Joyous song of being

Echoes in your beating heart

In the very pulse of blood in your veins



You have heard the mermaids singing

Each to each

And to you.

For you are their song

You have only to sing along

Relativity

Relativity



How time has slowed

The ticking of the clock

Echoes

The drip of the facet

Loudly

Pounds, water on metal

As hammer to anvil



Even the beat of my heart

Ka-thumping slowly now

Befogged

As in mental molasses

Mired

Time stretches to a breaking point

In this Sargasso sea.



Relativity?

This is the proof

kiss from a shortstop

It was truly the only time I desired a kiss from a shortstop.

Muscles tensed in anticipation,

Ponytail fluttering, windsock-like,

gauging direction and speed,

as she waited, crouching, open armed,

Welcoming the speeding white orb.

Swallowed up in her cat like grasp,

For a split second, suspended in my memory, a Greek statue,

Brown and glistening,

Balanced on one foot,

Turned and launched,

A rocket blur of arm.



The first baseman,

Uncoiling as a human slinky,

toward the throw,

Ball disappearing in a white puff of dust.



My shortstop, my Grecian work of art, turns,

thumb up in my direction,

Goddess of the diamond,

“Told you I could” smirk in her smile.