"Winter Birds", jane kohut-bartels, watercolor, 2005'
This poem was stolen by a website this summer. I say stolen because no permission was asked and no permission was given to link this to their site. Had the linker asked, I certainly would have given permission. There have been hundreds of readers of this poem from that site, sometimes this amount daily, but they apparently don’t think. I have no idea where this was placed, but I wish people would have some integrity. Perhaps this isn’t possible on the internet. This poem will be included in the soon-to-be-published, “White Cranes of Heaven”.
–
Lady Nyo
–
SAMHAIN
–
Dark mysterious season,
when the light doesn’t
quite reach the ground,
the trees shadow puppets
moving against the gray of day.
–
I think over the past year
praying there has been
a kindling in my soul,
the heart opened, warmed
and the juiciness of life is more
than in the loins–
a stream of forgiveness
slow flowing through the tough fiber
not stopper’d with an underlying bitterness
but softened with compassion.
–
This season of constrictions,
unusual emptiness,
brittle like dried twigs
desiccated by hoar frost
just to be endured.
–
I wrap myself in wool
and watch the migrations–
first tender song birds
harkening back to summer,
then Sandhill cranes,
legs thin banners
streaming behind white bodies,
lost against a snowy sky.
–
They lift off to a middling cosmos,
while I, earth-bound,
can only flap the wings of my shawl,
poor plumage for such a flight,
and wonder about my destination.
–
Jane Kohut-Bartels
Copyrighted, 2010
