Seeing North Light: February 2019

Saturday, February 9, 2019

Turning Point

There’s a point at which you turn a corner

set your course with a compass rose

reach for a long last leg of your journey

hoping a favorable wind will blow

you’ll sail through winter into spring

then succumb to sudden frost snow falling

on daffodil stems succulent still

though chilled erect then drooping wet

you’ll come ashore in time for cherries

strawberries raspberries blueberries beans

rhubarb pie. salad greens, peas more beans

figs, plums, apples for stock, spuds, parsnips, sprouts

when winter’s done summer will come there’s spring

even though a blizzard blow and sudden snow

Dick Russell

Monday, February 4, 2019

February

for Persephone

Everywhere bulbs awakening
beginning to bloom
when sudden snow then ice crust
sunshine snow drops rainbows

& even though she was not there

I was seeing what I intended to see

Spring rushing in before March molests

with sudden frosts nipping her breasts

Dick Russell

Saturday, February 2, 2019

Vin de Noir

As darkness fell

two daffodils gleamed

in January just gone

near the path just dug

weeded of hyacinths

last year

As darkness falls

talk of two raised beds

down near the fruit tree

where parsnips failed

in rich loam

infested with roots

from the apple tree

Vin de noir

served at sunset

long before dinner

walnut wine mixed

with cabernet

Dick Russell

For Tom Pickard

Did he ever tell you that same story

he told me?

when in want of a grant

Yeats, Pound and Eliot: all three

supported Bunting and no grant was given

he’d keep whatever clout he had

to better support you

you had a good friend in BB

did you ever wander Wark Forest way?

those new plantations round Roughside

full grown now

hard hill country farms

better as forest

lonely cottages just like yours

only surrounded by trees

where short-eared owls patrolled rows of conifers

adders basked in the sun

some poetry was getting done.

Dick Russell