Spring Day
Blustery breezes, sunshine and sudden shower
Banish hoary-handed winter from the land.
Burgeoning buds and lancing leaves appear,
With stark trees gowned in gossamer green.
Deep snowflake drifts of blackthorn bridal lace
Burden tangled twigs and naked branches.
Below the hedgerow, among the grasses,
Tapestries of violets and primroses,
Cascading stars in vivid verdant sky.
Magical, mystical hares box together
As strutting pheasant with loud screeching cry
Levers high aloft with flapping feather.
The silent, dark, descending cloak of night
Takes from the earth its sparkling sapphire light.
Summer Storm
Oppressive ponderous heat of summer
From a glassy azure vaulted dome beats down.
The dusty earth hard with crack and fissure
Languishes exposed to August sun.
Pewter-black dragon clouds spread pinion wing
Breathe sheets of forked ferocious flame,
Rumble, roar and rage in their thundering.
Clawing the heavens ragged, onward come
Steel nails of rain pounding, piercing, stabbing,
Hammering deep into parched arid land.
Refreshed softer warmth returns again,
Busy buzzing bees and butterflies abound,
Until dusk when fiery sunset glow forsakes
The world to the silent, silken, swoop of bats.
Autumn Bonfire
Hips and haws hang heavy flaming, burning
Amongst the sear foliage of gilded trees.
The dun fields of fresh furrowed ploughing,
Sounds of tractor humming, seagulls screeches,
As I bend to light piles of twigs and leaves.
Scarlet serpent fangs sting, lick and flicker
And slate grey smoke curling, billows and swirls,
Sharp, acrid, stinging eyes with scorching tear.
Crackling and spitting, galloping fire gnaws,
Devouring detritus of summer past.
Keen gusts breathe new strength as the blaze renews,
Then the final glimmer of smouldering grass
Extinguishes. Just leaving weightless ash,
Dusky twilight and lasting loneliness.
A Frosty Day
With glacial etching by winter’s marble hand
A frosty firmament of glittering stars appears.
Whilst on another pane a ghostly land
Of silent sentinel stems and icy flowers.
Beyond the obscurity of the frozen filigree
Bleached and blackened branches scratch and splinter.
Arrow flights of swans pierce an armoured sky.
Sculpted lapwings stand in the hoary spear
On an opal wasteland of a fecund field.
Water lies imprisoned in granite walls.
Soundlessly the midnight flocks soar and wheel,
While silence is shattered by a fox’s screams.
The twilight winter world is moon pallid
When darkness envelops the biting cold.
Learn more about Pat Argar, The Rural Writer, on the Contributors page.
- Poems by The Rural Writer (Pat Argar) - August 6, 2020