Posted by

Brenda Davis Harsham

Posted on

April 2, 2015

Posted under

Photography, Poetry

Comments

33 Comments

Ghost Leaf

Oak leaf rimed,
Bleached winter white,
Stark skeleton aglow.

A bit of starlight,
Its light grown white,
A transient in the universe,

The writing is plain:
An early calling card
Of Lady Spring’s visit.

Perhaps I’ll pour the tea,
Remembering heat,
Wishing for sunlight.

Note: I’ll lift my teacup in a toast to Lady Spring, whose velvety green cloak will swirl around us any day. And I’ll dedicate this ghostly post to Poetry Friday, this week hosted by a wonderful children’s poet, Amy Ludwig VanDerwater, at her blog, The Poem Farm. It’s National Poetry Month, and the kidlitosphere is lit by the radiance of many special events, some listed by Jama, the Poetry Potentate. If you like poetry, you can dine until sated this month!

Posted by

Brenda Davis Harsham

Posted on

March 30, 2015

Posted under

Photography, Poetry

Comments

40 Comments

Sycamore at Sunset

Winter light dwindles to a pale sunset.
Sycamore bark peels in patches.
Ever on sentry duty, an eye on the horizon,
Glowing like a desert landscape,
The silent tree watches for
Spring, as winter melts away.

Posted by

Brenda Davis Harsham

Posted on

March 26, 2015

Posted under

Photography, Poetry

Comments

41 Comments

Diamond Snow Tanka

pink morning light
gilds young trees, knee-deep in ice
thousands of diamonds

break light into rainbows,
blinding me to spring

Note: Tanka is defined in Oak Leak Tanka. This photograph was taken this spring. You can compare it to a picture taken last winter of the same trees in Five Brothers Tanka. This poem is in honor of Poetry Friday, hosted this week by Check it Out.

Posted by

Brenda Davis Harsham

Posted on

March 19, 2015

Posted under

Holiday, Photography, Poetry

Comments

55 Comments

Spring Magic

And above all, watch with glittering eyes
the whole world around you because the greatest secrets
are always hidden in the most unlikely places.
Those who don’t believe in magic will never find it.

— Roald Dahl (Minpins, 1991)

Drip,
Rain
Drop
Plops,
Spring will come
With black mud, bees
And crocuses beneath trees.
Baby robins will scatter shells.
Fairies will chant vernal spells.
Birds will sing madrigals at dawn
To wood violets blooming on the lawn.
Foxglove’s speckled trumpets will play
With snowdrops and magnolias in May.

snowdrops

Ours shall be the gypsy winding
Of the path with violets blue,
Ours at last the wizard finding
Of the land where dreams come true.

— Lucy Maud Montgomery (from Spring Song)

Note: My poem, Spring Magic is a concrete poem, taking the shape of a drooping tulip or possibly a lily of the valley bell as suggested by Matt Forrest Ersenwine. Thanks, Matt! Happy Spring! This post is an ode to Spring in honor of the Vernal Equinox which is at 6:45 p.m. here on March 20, 2015. And a happy coincidence, also in honor of Poetry Friday, hosted this week by Catherine Flynn at Reading to the Core who shared a wonderful original poem for World Folk Tales and Fables Week. I hope you have time to visit her. The photographs were all taken last spring — this year the ground is covered by a knee-deep sea of receding white ice.

Posted by

Brenda Davis Harsham

Posted on

March 18, 2015

Posted under

Photography

Comments

16 Comments

Wordless Song of Seasons

Posted by

Brenda Davis Harsham

Posted on

March 13, 2015

Posted under

Photography, Poetry

Comments

49 Comments

Sounds of Spring

Thwomp-Boom, ice dams fall.
Birds sing as sunshine strengthens.
Drip, drip, icicle lengthens;
When will the snow go?

Canada Geese waddle into traffic,
Honking: Where’s the ground?
Where can food be found?
When will the snow go?

Cars honk back; engines roar.
Traffic stalls and goggles at geese.
Is it spring despite me wearing fleece?
When will the snow go?

This Poetry Friday is wrangled by Author Amok. May your inner child be joyful this weekend!

Note: I was driving back from the pediatrician with my son, who clonked his head on the ice Sunday night (he has a mild concussion and will be fine), when two prosperous-looking Canada Geese waddled right across the busy road. The sight of them in the road is unusual, they generally congregate on grassy lawns. It reminded me that the wild things are even more inconvenienced by the remaining mountains of snow than I am. And that spring is nearly here!! Woo-hoo! The geese have returned! Given I was driving, I didn’t get a picture of them.

Posted by

Brenda Davis Harsham

Posted on

March 11, 2015

Posted under

Photography, Poetry

Comments

30 Comments

Remembering Leaves

With puddles and ice
Lining sidewalks and streets,
I remember leaves.

First, the tease of buds.

Then the unfurling of
New leaves, palest green,
Sidewalks awash in bud casings.

Leaves as backdrop to the blooming of
Dogwoods, tulip magnolias, pink cherries,
White pear and apple,
Mauve plum and citrine cassia.
Continue reading →

Posted by

Brenda Davis Harsham

Posted on

November 29, 2014

Posted under

Photography, Poetry

Comments

45 Comments

November Rose

pink November rose,
sweet-smelling fragrance rises
perfumes dreams of spring

Note: The snow has arrived, and we are eating chocolate-chip oat cookies and apple crisp. We taught the boys to play hearts, and having fun. I hope you are, too. Blessings to all!

Note 2: Unbelievably, I wrote this post yesterday, and I ran out of time to post it before other duties called. Then Michelle Marie wrote her post for me, that I reblogged today, and it’s as if she knew!! She is psychic!

Posted by

Brenda Davis Harsham

Posted on

June 5, 2014

Posted under

Photography, Poetry

Comments

27 Comments

Spring Bonnets

lacy-capped mushrooms
popping up all over town
spring bonnets

Posted by

Brenda Davis Harsham

Posted on

June 3, 2014

Posted under

Humor, Photography, Poetry

Comments

31 Comments

Fairy Tale Flower

To glow in the cold rain,
When bleak skies are dim,
And never once complain,
You could be written by Grimm.

Posted by

Brenda Davis Harsham

Posted on

May 25, 2014

Posted under

Photography, Poetry

Comments

33 Comments

Flower Maelstrom

colorful maelstrom
paradise of May flowers
butterflies welcomed

Posted by

Brenda Davis Harsham

Posted on

May 8, 2014

Posted under

Photography, Poetry

Comments

15 Comments

Sunset and the Bee

Bees gather nectar, frantic to finish tonight,
Before the ending day’s golden twilight
Has turned into black, stormy night.
The first spring blooms are key
For life of tree
And bee.

Note: My poem has six lines, with the rhyming pattern, AAABBB, and 12 syllables in the first line, and then decreasing by two syllables per line, until the last line, which has 2 syllables (or: 12, 10, 8, 6, 4, 2). I wanted to use a diminishing syllable count to parallel the dwindling of bees from colony collapse disorder. This poem is similar to a nonet, but the nonet has nine lines, with 9 syllables on the first line, and then it decreases by one syllable per line until the last line, which has one syllable.