Last January
It snowed
Huge flakes fell out of a grey sky
Cotton wool pieces
Layering up
Cold biting my bones
Blanketing the world with a white duvet
Smothering sounds
Birds hushed
Edges softened
Till drip, drip, drip
The thaw arrives.
Snowflakes?
Tag: Winter
Cold chills
Something cold
Something blue
Strong winds
Cold showers
Gale force time
Leaves off the trees
Strewn on the ground
Kicking them round.
Run through the mounds
Of yellow and gold
Reds and russets
Spiralling down.
Crisp and clear
Frost on the way,
Sparkling blue skies
Or raining all day.
Overcast with clouds
Grey and misty
Fungi are found
Surrounded by mystery.
Soon will be winter
End of bright colour
Till spring
Comes again
In showers and bluster.
Roses
The roses have faded and are gone. Only memories stay with you. Perfume, thorns.
The autumn and fungi are here, rosehips are swelling, elderberries feed the birds. Clouds are gathering, nights are earlier, mornings later. Time for spooky evenings, pumpkins and spiders. Black cats and rats. Mists descend, people try and raise their spirits with bonfires and fireworks, lighting up the sky with flashes and whizzes. Now few entertainments will be allowed. Life continues, but a grey boredom faces us. Keep away, keep away, keep away, the bird Sings. Out of the darkness people laugh, hide, drink, get up to high jinks. Fools for a day or the season. As the year creeps on festivals are cancelled, subscriptions to TV channels you never watched before increase. Firms named after rain forests cash in. Work continues but strangely. And snacks to comfort us are eaten. Winter arrives in cold airs and frosts, the seasons turn. Will spring and rose buds ever return or will black spot spoil the days?
Leaf
One yellow leaf, fallen
Sitting with weeds and grass
Old brown leaves
Already over.
Leaves that turn to mulch
Rotting
Nutrients
Sinking
Into the ground
To renew next year
Feed the roots
To grow new shoots
After winters sleep.
Leaves
Leaves leave
Leafy loss
Trees shiver
Bare branches shake.
Wind blows
Northern ice
Frost burns
Firey colours
Through your crown.
Here today
Gone tomorrow….
Gold, red and green….
Brown
Mulch.
Winter greys
Soon there will be bare trees
Dark skies
Fallen leaves
Damp leaf litter
Cold miserable ducks
Sitting on icy ponds
Or Canada geese
Stretching their legs
Ruffling their feathers
Trying to keep warm.
Weather drawing in
Cold wind
Rain falling in sheets
Snow and sleet showers.
Winter greys, not blues….
Remember snow?
Six months after this image was taken, and the garden is in full growth. The cherries on the tree are swelling and lichen is growing on the tree.
Life runs in cycles. Soon the height of summer will be with with us. I hope it isn’t too hot. I don’t do heat. Maybe lockdown will end. Hopefully the virus will be bought under control. Only a small percentage of people have died out of earth’s massive population, but that doesn’t make the pandemic any less devastating. Maybe it’s time to think back and remember all those people who have died. Stay safe.
X
Branches
A mess of branches
before they were covered in green.
When air was cold and blue,
when stems bore ice.
When it was cold at night.
It was chill, and the moon shone,
through miriad twigs.
When night lasted
in the cold darkness,
from early dusk,
to late dawn.
Now the sun rises early
the heat rises to meet it,
I wake up late and fall asleep
late,
in the warm morning air.
Solstice
As the year waxes and wanes,
as time passes,
light rises and falls.
Life comes and goes,
hearing bird song, then silence.
Summer solstice,
the world is warm,
but days will shrink and shrivel.
Winter solstice,
the promise of warmth,
locked in ice,
day lengthens, nights slowly shrink.
North and South
seasons, polar opposites.
Hot in one hemisphere,
cold in the other.
Unless, near the equator,
seasons are less obvious,
No frozen wastes here.
World floating in space,
around Sol, the Sun, our star,
Earth tipped at an angle,
anchored by moon,
held in mutual gravity
Eternal?
The cold is seeping in….
This is the first day of spring, but it feels like mid winter. Our house isn’t that well insulated and if it gets cold it stays cold, high ceilings means that the heat rises and warms the upper part of the room before it gets to us down here on the floor. The wind is gusting from the north and whistling through the gap round the seal in the front window and kitchen. We had new windows put in, but I guess they were cheap, all we could afford. The front door slams when you go through it because they measured it wrongly, so the top sticks out more than the bottom, giving it a very strange cant.
The North Wind cools the house, rubs the heat away as it pushes past the walls. Out kitchen bathroom extention only has thin walls. It really needs an insulating layer outside, but instead ivy is taking over and a wisteria has been planted at the end. Plants don’t keep us warm, but the blackbirds like to nest in it.
Now I’m cooking our evening meal, the heat from the oven adds a little to the warmth. I could microwave the food, but the gas cooker gives a bit of extra heat.
One day it will be warm outside, the leaves will grow, and we shall have spring and summer. X
