Purple smudge

purple smudge

at sunset . . .

shortest day

*    *    *    *

Head in the clouds

A Rengay by Bill Waters & Caroline Skanne

hedgerow —
100 starlings
rise up

sunlight in the silver birch
so much laughter

a cooling breeze
through shrubs and trees . . .
my head in the clouds

waning sun . . .
a ladybird enters
the conversation

hidden in the hawthorn
sparrows rustle the shadows

last scrap
of twilight vanishes
with the fox

---

Published in Hedgerow: A Journal of Small Poems, issue 100, 12/16/16.

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Two on winter

standing

in the cold canal,

cattails

 

sifting down

into drifts . . .

winter silence

---

Published in Akitsu Quarterly: Winter 2016 (http://www.wildgraces.com/Akitsu-Quarterly.html), 12/7/16.

*    *    *    *

Four tanka

sipping my coffee —
shop awnings
striped and stippled
with sun and shade
up and down the avenue

cloudy blue sky
painted on the brick wall . . .
at each level
of the fire escape
a pot of red geraniums

tucked beneath
an overpass:
tangle of bittersweet
and a cardboard hovel
that someone calls home

almost dawn . . .
night packs its bags
catches a cab
and heads for the station
as day comes in the door

---

Published in the anthology Neon Graffiti: Tanka Poetry of Urban Life, November 2016.

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