Conversation (Day 464)

Slithering vines still.

A conversation begins.

Listening to stones.

Careless, current slows.  

Diffident flames stir cool air.

Smoke winds like sorrow.

(c) 2018, by Hannah Six

Image: StockSnap/Pixabay

Hygge Tanka (Day 344)

On windows, frost blooms

Steam unravels from damp wool

Fire sighs and settles

Melting daylight drips like gold

Silent as cats, drafts slink in

(c) 2017, by Hannah Six

Beach Fire (Day 328)

Freighters’ lights, like stars,

glimmer and swim

in the distance. Between swells, 

they fall from view. Our eyes 

track their progress, instinctively

seeking their reappearance

each time they drop into vast 

watery valleys below the black 

horizon. Watching driftwood burn,

we feel the cold sand dampening.

Nearby, waves tumble and hiss,

closer now than before. The tide 

is turning. We must go.

(c) 2017, by Hannah Six

Image: Aris_Tsitiridis

First Frost (Day 322)

The saga of Roy G. Biv, unpresidential president, will continue tomorrow. He needed a mental-health day. Meanwhile...Winter.

Yesterday evening, a front blew 

through, stealing the last warm 

days, leaving our corner of 

the world shivering and serious. 

This morning, we are hunting 

spare blankets in unused closets, 

pulling on thick wool socks, 

and seeking the slippers 

mysteriously missing since May.

Now is a heavenly time to 

sit back and consider the spring. 

These long nights are sublime 

for leafing through gardening 

catalogs, planning vacations, 

and pondering roads that 

diverge in the woods up ahead. 

(c) 2017, by Hannah Six

Note: Source of the final two lines is The Road Not Taken, by Robert Frost, whose poetry I have always loved. 

Image: Kellepics 

Sea-swept (Day 279)

they danced at midnight

on a sea-swept isle  all coral 

haze and lagging rhythms

less than one day’s sail beyond

the bounds of measurable time

into the early morning 

hours like embers glow 

their rolling hues diffused against 

the crumbled walls of a secret 

beach embraced by headlands 

and a jealous sky   they unwrapped 

the gifts they carried  unfolding 

tales half by half  attentive 

to the rushing surf  

each listening  awestruck  to the sea

hushed and tender  whispering 

from deep inside the chambered shell

of the other’s upturned heart

(c) 2017, by Hannah Six

Free image via Pexels