2.20.2009

Sun Rises

This poem was inspired by a series of photos taken by a friend. One of these photos is presented below.



Sun Rises


The crisp air drags a finger across the glassy
surface, over hills and rising fields,
rippling trees and sky with tangled textures and
windblown hair, wisps of light that cover her eyes
but not the addictive smile etched across

my window. I strain to see in focus through the deep,
round frost, corn silk glowing gold and twisting into every
twig and finger of the winter ash and pine that stand
guard along the rocky shore,
(and I hear the faint voice of music, a soft treble





whispered across strings and mountains, an echo of
a summer long since gone to sleep. And she lingers
as a gentle spirit, back turned, looking ever forward)
and the shore scattered with sentinels cold and muted grey;
I see red brushed across her cheeks. Oh, how I wish

I had kissed them just once more, that satin skin
raised shy above her lips curled up in a reluctant
smile and drawing a line in thick crystal
up to her clear, glittering eyes. The winter chill
breathes soft across the glassy surface,

decorating the ice that spreads slow and gentle --
silver spider webs dusted with clean, paper
doilies -- while the bleached skulls of ancient kings
stand bright upon rivers, stones and tides. She stands
upon cracked earth and rising fields

and lifts her chin, eyes closed, to breathe
in the morning sun that soon will saunter
through the jagged woods, mingling with the current of a new
day. And a long anticipated smile spreads
with a sigh across her lips -- moments later

she catches fire and dances with the phoenix
in the thin space between the world and the night
and all of the dreaming -- while she hums in tune
with the last dissipating refrain, (she must hear it, too),
quiet and calm, and magically waking.

It was, in a word, Freezing; and also
in another word, Beautiful,
that spirit hour before the sun
rises, and when I flutter and drift, and
wake in that moment made of moments, the now that
crawls and walks, and flies on into forever,

I take comfort and lift myself from my frosted sleep, over
the fractured fingers of birch and pine, and I glimpse her
in the glassy surface, and warm my hands upon her feathers
all aflame, as she runs out to the lake, and watches the sun
get up. And I rise.

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