Rustle Of Orange

I walk beneath the oaks in their autumn

rustle of orange flames burning summer

from limbs wondering if the robin’s song

still clings to its abandoned nest or has

the wind swallowed the memory of rebirth.

The sky above me is a cloud of wings

chasing a resting place where snowflakes

have never frozen their place in vocabulary,

the mating call is silent, home is a gypsy camp

waiting for instinct to find north again.

In this beautiful landscape of dying I collect

visuals to charm me through the skeleton hours

of frost when daylight is a mere thought

between bookends of midnight and prayers for spring.

 ©Susie Clevenger 2014

This is written for Margaret's Play It Again Toads #10 I chose to revisit Kerry's A Toads favo(u)rite Poem which featured the poet Dylan Thomas, whose style I amateurishly tried to emulate.