Photo at right by Kathabela in Winnert, Germany
Winter’s Child
Sharon Hawley
A stork upon a Winnert pole
in gentle Germany warmth
senses shortening summer days
Africa comes to mind
so sweetly that it haunts her
The way she knows, the coastal route
but something quivers in her restless heart
a wistful wild and idle pleasure
falls upon her sleepy mind
Why seek the warm, she asks
when winter pleasure might lie north?
in places storks have never gone
She steals a hasty northward glance
then to north she gazes
til soothing dreams she dreams
upon her Winnert perch
The following day she broods and frets
mock study fills her nest
her heart leaps up
and wanders like a sudden breeze
on frozen lake and lovely snow
upon their shapes and sounds
in that eternal language
known to birds who fly
She hears the universal teacher
who would mold her future thoughts
hang them up in icicles
all seasons will be sweet, he says
Her mind returns of course
to well-known trips
south and safe and understood
they served a well-known purpose well
The more she thinks
the more she knows
and then she sets her mind
casting off accepted facts
she chooses ones that please her
She sets a course up north today
while standing on a Winnert perch
makes a toy of somber thought
she dreams of dark and cold
For the first time I see the Aurora Borealis as a multi-color dreaming stork... and there's a little restlessness in me for having been responsible for this extended metaphor by my own wanderings... into the stork nest... I wonder what would have happened if I didn't mention the stork!? It's not the cause, I know, This bold contrary urge would have taken on another manifestation... I like the stork, and imagine how disappointed Winnert is when this wild free bird fies away , the whole town becomes an empty-nest. We'll miss you but you console us here, with a beautiful poem, inspiring pictures, thoughtful musings on choice.
ReplyDeleteSharon - this is a most deep, personal moving communication! (( echoic - several members of your audience say - nodding and softly applauding - nodding in agreement: "you can say that again, Tom!" :) echoic: a most deep
ReplyDeletepersonal,
moving and affective communication
I believe that you have spoken for a spirit of the time - a certain Zeitgeist which moves within us! This work is both personal and universal, timely and timeless.
happy wintering[[ entrusting to your mentor, we send you off to return with more visions shared and ever over-flowing with enriching self-fullfillment
Dear Sharon -- Here is a poem for you -- it loses the italics I'm afraid -- your phrases are italicized in the poem. Hope you like it. Love--me
ReplyDeleteThe Winter for Idle Pleasures
~ Taoli-Ambika Talwar
for Sharon Hawley
She dreams of dark and cold!
I think she has promises to keep,
So heading north is her design.
I remember all my years on a loom,
hearing the voice of northern lands—
with an ache. The north pole ride,
visions, cup cakes, whatever
my soul longed for! But here I am
in a southern land above the equator.
Wondering how long is my stopover!
No icicles or frozen lakes, but things to do
that seem to have lost meaning.
So I am here still, restless, wandering
with my hastily dancing thoughts
to lands and stories, but feet are quiet.
And she’s ready like a sudden breeze
it seems. Her feet thrilling in new shoes
and she’s ready to fly to hard ice!
My soul fragmented in myriad ways,
like a river with tributaries
calls anxiously for a voice Now
that enfolds that nurtures, as I do
those in need. I, too, must leave
one day. Before desire becomes sludge.
But she knows to run with the call
of the wild, partake of idle pleasures
that make and drink of poems—
May soft snows greet her foot fall
and perching heart—And when
she listens to her universal teacher
may she remember how saffron
flowers dance in the flooding sun!
And may we all remember—
our real teacher all aglow in us:
the eternal presence that leaps,
dancing when we aren’t watching.
#
Kathabela, I like your friendly phrases "bold contrary urge" and "thoughtful musings on choice." I know you will be there vicariously when the stork looks up at the Aurora Borealis and sees a multi-color dreaming stork looking back saying “I told you so.”
ReplyDeleteThanks Tom for seeing it as more than mere weirdness, for your look into the possible meanings of it. I hope to be overcome with something not imagined and to share something truly invigorating. “Spoken for a spirit of the time”—I like that. Live well and prosper.
Taoli, what a sweet poem and fine insight on my goings. I can’t believe how well you capture the uncertainty of it and the pleasure that uncertainty brings: “the eternal presence that leaps, dancing when we aren’t watching.”—Yes
I feel that you are all getting the idea of this venture, that it is not so hard a sell as I expected. You are scaring me with your encouragement. But please don’t stop.
In the summer, leaves on trees absorb sound; but during winter it is snow. The silence will be smooth and delicious.
ReplyDeleteSmooth and delicious with the swish of skis or the stroke of blades on ice, possibly smooth as easy guitar on a warm evening in Sierra Madre.
ReplyDeleteStars, Sharon. Something wonderful happens to starlight when the air is very cold. They twinkle (the song was accurate) and send out slivers of light. For that, and for the quiet that comes with cold, I envy you. Liz
ReplyDelete“Twinkle, twinkle little star, how I wonder what you are. Up above the world so high, like a diamond in the sky.” I will look for the slivers of light—may they pierce me—and for the quiet that comes with the cold. Thanks, Liz, these are good words.
ReplyDeleteRight now I think you ARE "above the world so high"... in the plane and on your way? Or maybe you have landed and will be walking into your first nest in International Falls soon... Hope they have prepared a cosy one for you, and that this stork just landed has lots of wireless internet!
ReplyDeleteThe stork is happily landed and wirelessly internetted. I was a good flight and a good landing.
ReplyDeleteI think I am close to reading every post -- will nail these down too -- why the heck not...
ReplyDeleteGreat Michael, You mad it all the way. Hurray!
ReplyDeleteWinter's child redux: I came@thistime:summernow coincident to find this poem&myresponse this poem & my response and Sharon's
ReplyDelete........ the stork flew North and Sharon has been seen again in southernCalifornia climes, her voice heard in this summer ...... my question: what, sharon did you bring back?did you find that the right to follow whim:Freedom to fly against the easywind - is sufficient and enough to recompense any challenge you have taken [[we know:you have taken challenge & returned and taken challenges anew and gone:returned again]]
I have missed or perhaps forgotten your already answer to my question here framed above - i will cast imagining:aFeather with the spell to lead me to the answer to my question here, no matter:where & when - this is the feather cast
whence and when the northern windstirs
whence and when
whence and when
no sooner sayed than the northwind zephyr led me to your January .... :) entry and your answering to my question - no hmming & hawing - just the musings of an itinerant you
ReplyDelete