A Year of Sundays
As if a breathing god,
the night exhales a glaze
of ice to frost the sod
on January days;
a pale-enameled scene,
a coverlet of white,
devouring the green
with February’s bite.
Icicles overarch
the metal gutter-sluice
until the tongue of March
breaks winter’s cincture loose,
beginning thus the thaw
of April’s reckoning,
unhinging nature’s jaw
to let the songbirds sing
the aria of May,
an avian refrain
that sets the bright array
of spring’s enlivened reign.
But June is there to plot
its temperamental air
to swirl, untamed and hot,
into a solar glare,
which stares into July,
the iris—orange-red—
of one unblinking eye
in summer’s humid head.
The Cyclops rears and breathes
a heaviness of heat
as angry August seethes
and blurs the boiling street.
September, like a salve,
soothes summer parch and burn
on Earth, which yearns to have
the cool autumnal turn
to pumpkin, rust and squash,
October’s harvest tones,
the ancient hues that wash
over the earthy bones.
November will begin
the cycle winding round
as leaves (and seasons) spin
and float to rest aground.
December comes to go,
the winter winds portend,
by armoring to blow
a year to meet its end.
David Nelson Bradsher
David I think this is a most worthy poem you did justice to the unique aspect of each month in fine poetic fashion. Thank you for a poem that I believe should never have been given a lesser mark than 10.
This poem has not been translated into any other language yet.
I would like to translate this poem
Thank you, Mary. I was pleased with it, but I've experienced the phantom raters many times here, usually someone who doesn't appreciate rhyme and meter. To each their own.