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SIMPLER UNPRETENTIOUS DAYS
Across fields of emerald clover
Down a slender slope
A path ambles to a young girl
On a bald tire by a lash hung
From a giant century old limb
Of a gnarly, old oak tree.
Nearby in an inviting pond
A bug lolls on a leaf in the water
Gently transported downwind
By a sinuous stream of air currents
Beneath the silhouette of petite wings
The shadow of a monarch butterfly
Seeking solace upon a soft breeze.
Beneath a canopy of stagnate air
Superheated by the daytime sun
A raucous song is croaked by a frog
In the oppressive afternoon heat.
Mile-high pillows of puffed vapor
Occasionally vanquishes the sun
Sporadically shades the landscape
Like squares of a patchwork quilt.
The shade unclenches my eyes
The gentle ripple of undercurrents
Gently twists my inner tube
Upon that shimmering summer pond.
These memories still sweetly linger
Of the simpler unpretentious days
In the springtime of my life.
I was there! And I could have
I was there! And I could have stayed there in those "simpler unpretentious days" for the longest time. You chose the most impactful, charming and picturesque words to weave your bucolic idyll about a place and time sadly gone.
A poetic sanctuary. Mad about this!
Now that is Pure Poetry, and
Now that is Pure Poetry, and it is presenting one of Poetry's most ancient functions---to preserve a moment of time within a cluster of chosen words.
Starward
Thank you.
Actually it is a rewrite of a poem I wrote over 40 years ago.
You're welcome. I am very
You're welcome. I am very impressed with both the verb combinations, and the way the poem looks on the screen.
You're mention of rewriting reminded me of an anecdote about James Dickey's poem, "May Day Sermon." When I first encountered it, decades ago, it was touted as having been a sort of impromptu verbal gush that he wisely wrote down as it came to him, and then published it. After he passed away, scholars went through his papers and found a bundle of drafts for that very poem---so many drafts that the sum total of pages was equal to the total number of lines in the poem (and the poem is rather long). I heard it described as one of the most reworked poems in literary history.
I think your poem is better than anything I have ever read from the "Deliverance" poet.
Starward