Friday, May 31, 2019

Broken, open (Day 863)


When love breaks you
open   a brandy-warm glow
of goodbye aching deep
in your heart   familiar
consoling   this fragile
precious world shimmers
its countless strands
glistening in a sudden flash
of brilliance   visible  only
to eyes blessed by grief

(c) 2019, by Hannah Six
Image: UpSticksNGo/Flickr
(CC BY 2.0)

Thursday, May 30, 2019

Denial (Day 862)

All these days spent 

looking away

neither listening

nor seeking   

as if not knowing 

could make it be 

less so. 


(c) 2019, by Hannah Six

Inage: Pallab Halder/Pexels

Wednesday, May 29, 2019

Unmarred (Day 861)

impossible to watch 

these leaves   so tender   

so unmarred   to hear  

to feel  sublime against 

this rustling blue silk sky  

and other suns will rise  

and we  impermanent

will fade   the faint mist 

of another trailing day 


(c) 2019, by Hannah Six

Image: Ulleo/Pixabay


Tuesday, May 28, 2019

Still see her (Day 860)


In the subtle hours when imagination 

pirouettes   you may sometimes 

hear drifting clouds play 

a Mozart concerto to the red-blue sky   

listen   you can almost hear   

still see her   sense the unrecognizable   

a guest   uninvited   

but welcome in your house   

still see her   crumpled   

a velvet heap  against an otherwise-empty 

horizon   though you know she is not 


(c) 2019, by Hannah Six

Image: Pixnio


Monday, May 27, 2019

Here, where you are (Day 859)

On certain clear-light days, 

when your attention wanders 

and mounds of clouds glow 

on the horizon, you still see 

her, looming, out of the corner 

of your eye, and your breath 

catches, a gasp of recognition:

Oh, there you are. 

But, before you can smile, all 

the miles and years recall you 

to yourself, reminding you that, 

while she is there, you can’t see 

her, because she is not here, 

where you are. And, in that 

moment, you are sorry to have 

been mistaken, because you 

have lost her all over again. 


(c) 2019, by Hannah Six

Image: NOAA

Sunday, May 26, 2019

Cast your line (Day 858)

Cast your line
reel in an empty 
hook  shiny and new
again  cast out 
and reel in  again  
this water  still 
and silent as 
a shoe without 
a foot  a fish 
will bite  or not
your only choice: 
to cast your line 
into the void 
or stop

(c) 2019, by Hannah Six
Image: Vera_Croft/Pixabay

Saturday, May 25, 2019

Late (Day 857)


brash wind   coursing cataract 
breath carving canyons 
in your veins   each rapacious gust
urging us:  begin
we tended yearnings   gently 
glowing   like the morning sun   
sweet and slow   but late   
needing us:  begin 
and we are burning   now may 
do little more than watch   
through windows   firmly sealed
a coral-tinted tide abate 


(c) 2019, by Hannah Six
Image: US NPS

Friday, May 24, 2019

Wake up alone (Day 856)


your voice beckons  

back  I fall 

into the damp green night

I know you 

want me 

to wake up 

alone 

but how can you be so 

certain I can hear 

you  whispering 

from the gate where I left 

you  all those years 

since then  since wanting 

to find you  but not 

the world you painted

red and blue as autumn stars 

is farther away 

than it seemed then  

and in my dreams  

and it is 

hard going  clambering over 

this precarious terrain

so  just this once  say no  

tell me no

and let me have my way

I promise I will

close it  firmly  behind me  

when I leave


(c) 2019, by Hannah Six

Image: James McNeill Whistler, Nocturne in Blac

 and Gold: The Falling Rocket (1875), oil on panel, 

via Wikimedia Commons


Thursday, May 23, 2019

May Evening (Day 855)

All full bright flutter  spring 

melts into summer   heightens

each sweet whistle  flash of orange 

in the woods  flowers 

riding the soft wind  and soon  

twilight will shimmer  

siren darkness sing 

through open windows  veiled 

with strands of half-spun dreams


(c) 2019, by Hannah Six

Image: Melissa McMasters (CC BY 2.0)
via Wikimedia Commons

Wednesday, May 22, 2019

Carousel (Day 854)


veils of sky   clouds 

of delight    

we danced with the radio

softly into night 

before drifting off 

to sleep where we spun round 

and round 

making a liar of the honest blood 

shouting in my veins

and you its truth 


(c) 2019, by Hannah Six

Image: James Daisa (CC BY-SA 2.0)

via Flickr

Tuesday, May 21, 2019

Saturday morning story (Day 853)

Saturday morning story

long dirt road   dairy farms

buzz of airplanes overhead

and we had no place else to go

so we walked    farther 

than we’d ever gone before

and the world opened just 

a little   unexpected   delightful

corners unfolding bit by bit

revealing hints of wonders

we might uncover if we learned 

where to look   someday 

soon   but not that day  

when we wandered laughing   

up the road in the sun   because   

we were still children then

blessed with time and each other

and we had nowhere else to be



(c) 2019, by Hannah Six

Image: Jan Aredtsz (CC BY-ND 2.0)


Monday, May 20, 2019

Room for more (Day 852)

so much room for more
welcoming   allowing all
we cannot be like these
unique   making every other
blending   merging
and overhead a symphony
stretches then narrows
ahead the path
gray and gold and brown
until it turns   beckoning
forest of a thousand greens
never competing   each one
more so   and I wonder why
trees   like the sky   generous
as beauty   because there is

(c) 2019, by Hannah Six
Image: NOAA/Sheri Phillips

Sunday, May 19, 2019

The kind that vanishes (Day 851)


Maybe I forgot 

about him   maybe 

I forgot 

about his eyes

burning   how I felt

them on the naked

nape of my neck

maybe

I forgot   how 

he touched 

my bare shoulder 

as he passed   

soft and fleeting

as a dream   the kind

that vanishes

when morning comes

and you

open your eyes


(c) 2019, by Hannah Six

Image: JanserMaciel (CC BY-SA 4.0)

via Wikimedia Commons

Friday, May 17, 2019

Afternoon storm (Day 849)

The day grows dark 

blusters & chafes 

against a gray din 

of air conditioning 

& childrens’ voices

leaves toss swirling 

like laundry pinned

out to dry framed 

by windows waiting 

for the first burst of 

rain a thunderous 

release & by the time 

the storm passes night 

will have fallen again


(c) 2019, by Hannah Six

Image: Ronald Plett/Pixabay


Thursday, May 16, 2019

You can't argue with these things (Day 848)


you can't argue with these things   

hot afternoons   streaming   delicate 

incense   baked dust   pine resin 

and always always the lighthouse 

just out of view   terrible 

in its towering Olympian certainty   

a wandering heart   dreaming of prairies   

before and after  distant rumbling 

breakers teasing pristine sand then 

melting out of view   urging   beckoning 

a restless mind far as the eye can see


(c) 2019, by Hannah Six

Image: Danjocross/Pixabay



Wednesday, May 15, 2019

That Song (Day 847)

It was not the first time she heard him 

sing that song, and it would not be 

the last. Without knowing what he was 

doing, he would hum the tune—a little 

off-key—to himself, as if he was singing 

along with a top-40 hit on a portable radio 

propped in the sand near a faded blue

beach towel, 20 years in the past. 


(c) 2019, by Hannah Six

Image: Oleg Magni/Pexels

Tuesday, May 14, 2019

The Knowing (Day 846)

I saw it   a waning 

crescent   subtle 

against the tarnished sky

diplomatic   yet unable 

to answer for 

its untimely demise

consequence bent into 

a rich reward

(that’s what it feels like) 

when turbid water 

clears   and disturbing 

visions rise   rending 

a surface flawed as glass   

only the knowing 

will be left   

alone   in their gardens 

beneath the moon

tending bitter regrets


(c) 2019, by Hannah Six

Image: PxHere

 


Monday, May 13, 2019

Sunday, May 12, 2019

First swim (Day 844)


Dipping our toes   again   
   into that cold gray pool
A cleft between rocks where rain 
   and melted snow collect
Where   in January   implacable 
   ice imposes its will
Further dividing what was 
   once one 
Where   soon  we will take respite 
   from a searing July sun

(c) 2019, by Hannah Six
Image: PxHere

Saturday, May 11, 2019

A little romance (Day 843)

Fingers entwined, they walked the steep, curving road, the town like a magic carpet at their feet; beyond it, a blue-diamond sea unfurled to the sky’s edge. Twenty years ago, and he could not imagine where that time had gone. Twenty years, and his love had only grown richer, more nuanced, layer upon layer—strata of joy, grief, frustration, contentment—accumulating beneath their feet, lifting them, ever-so-gradually toward this moment. He knew the hand in his, so strong and loyal and firm, as if he had painted it, in minute detail, every day of his life. Each line on that face, engraved by harsh darkness and fierce light, by time itself, was a road that, no matter where he turned, led him home again. Sure-footed, they descended, neither hurrying nor lingering, in perfect step, toward tomorrow and the next day, toward the magic-carpet town and the blue-diamond sea where, nearly two decades ago, they had watched the sun rise in each others’ eyes, and had known.

(c) 2019, by Hannah Six
Image: Mantas Hesthaven, Pexels

Friday, May 10, 2019

Cento 86: When you come in (Day 842)

Like when you come in 
from the wind   transported 
through tumbling clouds 
because you needed 
a sense of dread   you 
took a tiny dream   sweet 
and warm   that fell 
to the empty streets 
and sidewalks   chastising   
those small dark possibilities 
like opening your door
like when you come in

(c) 2019, by Hannah Six
Image: Pixabay