“Darwins’ Worms”

Spiral right back into Life

 

The soil has lost its excellence.

Worms hide in the

Deep sullen earth

I imagine curled up,

Embracing worm castings

And each other,

Desiccated former selves

Pale little ghosts

Awaiting the fertility of spring

The watering of a hard rain.

 

I squandered the bloom months,

Thinking paper and pen

Would bring its own blossoming

Scarcely seeing the vitality outside

Windows,

Allowing cabbage moths and beetles

To dominate

My nod to farming,

To self-sufficiency,

My tithe to the earth.

 

Ah, the soil is hardened

By the sins of the season.

Sharp winds make

Furrows

The cold buries down,

Deep, deep down

Torments, teases any life

That would show a feckless head.

 

Especially those hopeful worms

Now bundled in worm-sleep.

 

The words, verse,

I chose to cultivate

Over cabbage, collards

Failed to bloom.

Better I had plied the hoe

And bucket to that

Than a fevered pen

To paper.

 

It is now winter.

The fallow earth

Plays a waiting game

Knows I have failed

In pulp and soil

And mocks with a barrenness

Inside and out.

 

Jane Kohut-Bartels

Copyrighted, 2014

(“Darwin’s Worms” was published in “Pitcher of Moon”, Jane Kohut-Bartels, Amazon.com, Createspace, 2014) 

 

 

 

 

 

Three Spring Poems….

 

Photo to the east

Spring Daffs, wc, janekohut-bartels, 2007

Today is the first day of Spring.  I am through with this long winter and look forward this tender season.  Already the red maple in the front garden is bursting with red helicopters of seed that fall with the developing winds.  The daffodils and grape hyacinths, the periwinkle and snow drops are blooming and the grass is daring to show a lushness that begs for a mowing.  I bought two foxgloves with the hope  of blooms   and a tray of red lettuce.  Of course next week will have colder temps overnight, but there is promise in the air.  This evening the sky was a mixture of pale blue and pink. The  doves were settling in the huge oaks and pecans, their cries  a mournful sound in the dusk light.

I think we are all grateful for this change of season.  Winter has stayed too long on the land.

Lady Nyo

–

 

Spring Moon

– 

The moon this spring afternoon

Floated high above the saddle of distant trees, hills,

As she pillowed on her part of the universe

Her face no more colored than a passing cloud.

 

She looked sleepy, tired—

Of course!  All this waxing and waning.

 

She looked down at me as she cuddled the pale sky

Just one eye awake,

A part of her mouth exposed

The rest of her face burrowed in a pillow,

 

No gleam, no interest  in prowling the heavens.

Just waking up—I expected her to yawn!

 

–

SPRING STORM

– 

The wind howls tonight

Races round eaves,

Disturbs  the haunts in the attic,

Forces wind chimes

Into a metal hambone frenzy

The clash of harmony grates

On ears, on nerves

no sleep for this night.

 

There is death to the west

Fear in the vanguard. 

It is springtime,

No gentle embrace

Just a blaze of destruction, despair.

Sanctuary

Is far down on the ground,

Deep as a cellar

Deep as the grave.

 

The moon above,

Sickly green sphere

Is in on the game.

 

The dogs howl

A Greek chorus

Echoing their primal fear

Over the landscape.

 

Each moan of wind

Heralds the apocalypse,

My eyes squeeze shut

Against grating of branches,

The rattle of panes

As I grasp for sanity

In an insane night.

  

I ride out the storm,

Dawn breaks,

The silence complete,

The earth placid and calm

As if the night before

Only a nightmare-

And I ridden from sleep

To the usual ground.

–

 Rude Spring

 

Sharp brittle wind

Sails like clipper glass

Cuts the skin razor thin,

And flays off winter.

 

This spring can’t wait.

It lies,

Promises comforting warmth

Yet delivers a numbing cold-

Too much in love with winter still.

 

I hear the laughter in the pines.

They moan, echo an evil chuckle.

 

No matter.

This argument will be over

Once the earth

Pirouettes on point.

 

=

Jane Kohut-Bartels

Copyrighted, 2014

poems from “Pitcher of Moon”, published at Createspace, Amazon.com, 2014

http://goo.gl/RzFRj4