“The Pears Fatten Like Little Buddhas”

The Manor Garden – by Sylvia Plath

The fountains are dry and the roses over.
Incense of death. Your day approaches.
The pears fatten like little buddhas.
A blue mist is dragging the lake.

You move through the era of fishes,
The smug centuries of the pig-
Head, toe and finger
Come clear of the shadow. History

Nourishes these broken flutings,
These crowns of acanthus,
And the crow settles her garments.
You inherit white heather, a bee’s wing,

Two suicides, the family wolves,
Hours of blankness. Some hard stars
Already yellow the heavens.
The spider on its own string

Crosses the lake. The worms
Quit their usual habitations.
The small birds converge, converge
With their gifts to a difficult borning.

Fish

I have a dish
For my fish;
My fish is dead,
It has no head.

14. Tick (Inktober 2021)

The Ticks

by Douglas Florian

Not gigan-tic.
Not roman-tic.
Not artis-tic.
Not majes-tic.
Not magne-tic.
Nor aesthe-tic.
Ticks are strictly parasi-tic.

(As an aside, I am behind again with Inktober!!)

12. Stuck (Inktober 2021)

A Santa Catastrophe

by Moi

Santa came to our house last night

The last stop on his weary flight,

Thinking of cookies or dreaming of beer.

Whatever, something happened I fear.

Headfirst he tumbled out of his sleigh

As all of his reindeer just flew away.

He fell straight down, downward into

Our old and tarry chimney flue.

Needless to say, he raised quite a fuss

And I heard many a new-to-me cuss.

We are not sure just what to do

So Santa is stuck in our dirty old flue.

Ode to Spring

Ode to Spring (by Andrew Elliott)

Oh glory be to things that grow!
That burgeon, blossom, bud and blow
In Springtime’s light and airy breeze,
Which ruffles softly new sprung leaves.

What tongue there be to justly praise
The wonders wrought by Vernal days?
These beauties bright which turn, indeed,
Each frozen heart to flaming glede.

O Daffodil! O Daffodil!
That covers well each downy hill—
E’en Solomon was not arrayed
In splendour such as you displayed.

Ah! Lovely Tulip, what to you
Is all the wealth of Timbuktu?
What, then, the gain of dye from Tyre—
When Gladdons blaze with purple fire?

Thou Cowslip and thou Daisy fair—
Thou Foxglove, Rose, and Lily rare—
Much more is your surpassing worth
Than all the gems throughout the earth!

Consider well what ecstasy
Lies cloistered in each Peony—
That dormant wait until the hour
Their chains are loosed, then start to flow’r.

Oh Spring, indeed, thou teachest well
That man, though wise, knoweth not the spell
Which makes all things by beauty bound—
That Mystery which none hath found.