Ode to Loveliness

I’m alone in the evening 

politics pulsing urgently in the news

traffic noise far-off and near-by birdsong

I was most alone when I most desired to be talented

to be able to write short stories in pubs 

or at an outdoor table in a French café

under a fringed canopy near a sheet plane glass window 

where I could see Hemingway 

oblivious except to words flowing onto the page

telling him the story he was writing

Persephone’s fragrance wafts in air

near a fast-flowing fountain

water splashing from its brink

where hummingbirds drink

She bathed nearby and her perfume lingers

all around blossoms touched by her fingers

Water flowing and falling forever

pumped into a bathing bowl songbirds prefer

then one larger robins use

then even bigger should they dare

a yard wide almost a foot deep

on a base decorated with acanthus leaves

upstairs a bath is running

Dick Russell © Richard M Russell

                    2024