Ute's Poetry and Musings

FOUR SEASONS

Snowflakes,
starry winter-flowers
falling from the far-off sky.

Tumbling lightly,
shining brightly,
dancing downward,

piling high
on the town’s tall garden fences,
roofs of houses;
all around
blanketing the whole wide city.

Icicles,
those glittering crystals,
sun-drenched, gleaming,
can be found.

Winter with its pristine beauty,
cold and sunny months is here.
Sledding, skating,
nothing’s finer
on a day
that’s crisp and clear.

***

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THE BEE

A lake that mirrors faithfully
and gives back my reflection
reflects my thoughts.

Oh water, essence of my being,
so still at times,
I dare not breathe.

I feel like sending you my soul, I think,
and right away become the droplet
and then as mist rise upwards
to the sky

while at the same time lazily
I lie among the flowers.

The air is still.

I feel
slight stirrings of a breeze.
A butterfly’s alighting on the jonquils.

I hear the humming of a bee I cannot see,
but sense quite near.
I hope it doesn’t sense my fear.

I quickly think, “Make honey, bee,
and let me be.”

Now I breathe in and out,
and ere I know I am the breeze,
and search the insect out.

“I do not mean you any harm.
See?  Here’s my arm.”

ON A MOMENT’S LOAN

Dew fresh,
the world is all brand-new,
air-rippled, trembling, crystal-blue.
Beneath the pine,
stand upright, straight,
brown cones
that fell and tumbled down.

Yet now it seems as if they’d grown
in rows of circles ’round the stem,
grown
as if planted there by hand,
grown
from pine needle cushioned ground,
as if they’re rooted there. I’ve found
in nature’s spontaneity
true order,
unsurpassed and free
of my own limiting ideas,
but limitless.

It now appears as if up high
a leaf umbrella shades the sky.
A maple arch forms its own dome
of a cathedral, Gothic style,
which, for a while,
contains my table, bench and chair.
Its walls are made of air on air.

In happiness I close my eyes.
To my surprise
I visit on a moment’s loan my very own
and just as vast, or vaster yet,
dear sunshine-dappled inner home.

June 1986

GREEN GREETINGS

There’s a chubby green face
in the old gnarled tree.
It sits tippy-top on a twig.
It’s got eyes, nose and mouth and …
fancy that:
it’s even got a wig.
Then the wind comes and takes it,
and shakes it about.
It’s got arms now, a body.
It is without doubt a green little fellow
with the face of a troll.
He keeps looking at me, right into my soul
while he moves, twists and turns and startles me so.
I wished he’d turn ’round, or at least look away,
but he stares and he stares, so long as I stay.
So I finally turn ’round.
He is just in my mind!
But his eyes bore right through me from behind.
About face I turn.
I can’t stand it much longer,
just to encounter that stare even stronger.
Whoops, a squirrel lands near him
and gives him a shove.
There!
His eyes grow so gentle, almost with love.
Then he lets me go free?
But that green little fellow who now full of glee
is grinning a green grin from ear to ear
is sending his leaf-green greetings to me:
From his eye falls a raindrop, big as a tear.
And now I am happy.
I had nothing to fear.
That dear, wise, old wonderful tree
loves and protects even me.

Strictly For The Birds

While reading I can hear you sing
insisting so
to put away my book
and pay attention to your thrills,
your songs, your company.

You sit there, then you fly amongst the treetops
and amongst green leaves
which are the leaves of your own books
and are mine too;
for in those leaves I find my soul refreshed.

Your song? It lifts my soul.
This poem? I must dedicate to you with thanks. But look!
It saddens me to think what you must think of ME, but please!
Take better aim and spare my book!

Bluebells

Bluebells, how they dance and swing on the meadow
where they bring heav’n to earth! I hear them ring
faintly first, then, as they cling globe to globe
they seem to sing cherished melodies of old.

Oh,
the joy
just to behold
those perfect bells
amongst leaf green,
sky-color-dipped
by hands unseen,
roots gripped firmly
in rich earth: a miracle
a ransom’s
w
o
r
t
h
!

Ute Kaboolian