The dusk drew earlier in

>>>>++<<<<

S l u r p   S l u r p

Hummingbird

Columbia, South Carolina

>>>>++<<<<

As imperceptibly as Grief

The Summer lapsed away --

Too imperceptible at last --

To seem like Perfidy --

A Quietness distilled

As Twilight long begun,

Or Nature spending with herself

Sequestered Afternoon --

The Dusk drew earlier in --

The Morning foreign shone --

A courteous, yet harrowing Grace,

As Guest, that would be gone --

> Emily Dickinson <

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Happy Saturday

It goes by too fast

>>>>++<<<<

C a s t i n g   L o t s

Jackson Avenue :: Knoxville Circles Series

Knoxville, Tennessee

>>>>++<<<<

Being too warm the old lady said to me
is better than being too cold I think now
in between is the best because you never
give it a thought but it goes by too fast
I remember the winter how cold it got
I could never get warm wherever I was
but I don’t remember the summer heat like that
only the long days the breathing of the trees
the evenings with the hens still talking in the lane
and the light getting longer in the valley
the sound of a bell from down there somewhere
I can sit here now still listening to it

> W.S. Merwin <

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Happy Friday

Before our shadows disappear

>>>>++<<<<

D i v i d e d   B y   F o u r

High Window :: Knoxville Circles Series

Knoxville, Tennessee

>>>>++<<<<

Every day our name is changed,
say stones colliding into waves.
Go read our names on the shore,
say waves colliding into stones.

Birds over water call their names
to each other again and again
to say where they are.
Where have you been, my small bird?

I know our names will change one day
to stones in a field
of anemones and lavender.
​
Before you read the farthest wave,
before our shadows disappear
in a starry blur, call out your name
to say where we are.

> Colette Inez <

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Happy Thursday

Full fair to see

>>>>++<<<<

G o   T o w a r d   t h e   L i g h t

Elmwood Cemetery

Columbia, South Carolina

>>>>++<<<<

Voice of the summerwind,
Joy of the summerplain,
Life of the summerhours,
Carol clearly, bound along.
No Tithon thou as poets feign
(Shame fall 'em they are deaf and blind)
But an insect lithe and strong,
Bowing the seeded summerflowers.
Prove their falsehood and thy quarrel,
Vaulting on thine airy feet.
Clap thy shielded sides and carol,
Carol clearly, chirrup sweet
Thou art a mailèd warrior

in youth and strength complete;
Armed cap-a-pie,
Full fair to see;
Unknowing fear,
Undreading loss,
A gallant cavalier
Sans peur et sans reproche,
In sunlight and in shadow,
The Bayard of the meadow.

> Alfred, Lord Tennyson <

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Happy Wednesday

One of my many balconies

>>>>++<<<<

H e a r t   O n   M y   S l e e v e

Defunct Funeral Home

Columbia, South Carolina

>>>>++<<<<

Ok, I no longer want them,
the many selves I had to manage

that once exhausted friends. I believed

in angels then, thought I might be
an angel -- that was me, flying off

on a tangent, just so we could land
on one of my many balconies

so we could look down on everyone.

> Ira Sadoff <

>>>>++<<<<

Happy Tuesday

All my sins He then forgave

>>>>++<<<<

F r i l l   S e e k e r

Bonaventure Cemetery

Savannah, Georgia

>>>>++<<<<

Love divine, so great and wondrous

Deep and mighty, pure, sublime

Coming from the heart of Jesus

Just the same through tests of time.

He the pearly gates will open

So that I may enter in

For he purchased my redemption

And forgave me all my sin.

Like a dove when hunted, frightened

As a wounded fawn was I

Brokenhearted, yet He healed me

He will heed the sinner's cry.

Love divine, so great and wondrous

All my sins He then forgave

I will sing His praise forever

For His blood, His pow'r to save.

In life's eventide, at twilight

At His door I'll knock and wait

By the precious love of Jesus

I shall enter Heaven's gate.

He the pearly gates will open

So that I may enter in

For He purchased my redemption

And forgave me all my sin.

> Fredrick A. Blom <

>>>>++<<<<

But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard,

neither have entered into the heart of man,

the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.

I Corinthians 2:9

>>>>++<<<<

Happy Sunday

Your hands hold roses

>>>>++<<<<

A b i d i n g

The Horseshoe

Columbia, South Carolina

>>>>++<<<<

One wading a Fall meadow finds on all sides
The Queen Anne's Lace lying like lilies
On water; it glides 
So from the walker, it turns
Dry grass to a lake, as the slightest shade of you
Valleys my mind in fabulous blue Lucernes.

The beautiful changes as a forest is changed 
By a chameleon's tuning his skin to it; 
As a mantis, arranged 
On a green leaf, grows
Into it, makes the leaf leafier, and proves
Any greenness is greener than anyone knows.

Your hands hold roses always in a way that says
They are not only yours; the beautiful changes
In such kind ways, 
Wishing ever to sunder
Things and Thing's selves for a second finding, to lose 
For a moment all that it touches back to wonder. 

> Richard Wilbur <

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Happy Friday

The darkness was red-gold

>>>>++<<<<

W e   T w o

Elmwood Cemetery

Columbia, South Carolina

>>>>++<<<<

All night our room was outer-walled with rain.
Drops fell and flattened on the tin roof,
And rang like little disks of metal.
Ping! -- Ping! -- and there was not a pin-point of silence between them.
The rain rattled and clashed,
And the slats of the shutters danced and glittered.
But to me the darkness was red-gold and crocus-colored
With your brightness,
And the words you whispered to me
Sprang up and flamed -- orange torches against the rain.
Torches against the wall of cool, silver rain!

> Amy Lowell <

>>>>++<<<<

Happy Thursday

Strict songs in the high pines

>>>>++<<<<

W a i t   L o s s

Swan Lake Iris Gardens

Sumter, South Carolina

>>>>++<<<<

It’s true there were times when it was too much
and I slipped off in the first light or its last hour
and drove up through the crooked way of the valley

and swam out to those ruins on an island.
Blackbirds were the only music in the spruces,
and the stars, as they faded out, offered themselves to me

like glasses of water ringing by the empty linens of the dead.
When Delilah watched the dark hair of her lover
tumble, she did not shatter. When Abraham

relented, he did not relent.
Still, I would tell you of the humbling and the waking.
I would tell you of the wild hours of surrender,

when the river stripped the cove’s stones
from the margin and the blackbirds built
their strict songs in the high

pines, when the great nests swayed the lattice
of the branches, the moon’s brute music
touching them with fire.

And you, there, stranger in the sway
of it, what would you have done
there, in the ruins, when they rose

from you, when the burning wings
ascended, when the old ghosts
shook the music from your branches and the great lie

of your one sweet life was lifted?

> Joseph Fasano <

>>>>++<<<<

Happy Friday

Quick and envious tears

>>>>++<<<<

F o l l o w s

Bonaventure Cemetery

Savannah, Georgia

>>>>++<<<<

God's acre was her garden-spot, she said;
She sat there often, of the Summer days,
Little and slim and sweet, among the dead,
Her hair a fable in the leveled rays.

She turned the fading wreath, the rusted cross,
And knelt to coax about the wiry stem.
I see her gentle fingers on the moss
Now it is anguish to remember them.

And once I saw her weeping, when she rose
And walked away and turned to look around --
The quick and envious tears of one that knows
She shall not lie in consecrated ground.

> Dorothy Parker <

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Happy Tuesday