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~ Linda R Davis, Raven of Peace & Poetry

Bits of Poetry

Tag Archives: aspen

I Envy the Aspen’s Sleek Body

21 Monday Nov 2022

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

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Tags

2-line poems, aspen, Ezra Pound, Imagism, In A Station of the Metro, Modern Poetry, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Short Poems

I Envy the Aspen’s Sleek Body

Unmoved, while her leaves shake, turn color, fall.  
Alone, naked, enduring all; she’s bare again.

This is an exercise in making a longer poem as short as it can be, in the fashion of Ezra Pound’s, “In a Station of the Metro.”

The apparition of these faces in the crowd:
Petals on a wet, black bough.

The first draft of this poem was, “Her Arms.”

I envy the Aspen,
With her sleek, white body,
She stands unmoved,
While her leaves shake,
Turn color, fall,
And she is left,
Naked and alone,
In wind, rain, snow,
Enduring all,
Judging none,
No complaining.
In spring, I remember
Her limbs rejoiced
In buds, then leaves,
And birds.
They gathered
In her arms:
Robin, magpie,
Sparrow, finch, falcon.
This autumn was summer,
Then winter,
She is bare again.
The chickadees bounce
From perch to perch,
Fully happy in her embrace.
During this too early winter,
When we lose faith,
Fall to our knees,
Barely endure
dark day after dark day;
She stands reaching,
Arms outstretched to the sun
Beyond the clouds.
You must see now,
Why I envy the Aspen,
How she will survive,
And thrive, beyond me.

If you have a 2-line poem (3, with title), please share it in the comments.

Her Arms

14 Monday Nov 2022

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

aspen, chickadee, Death, Death Poems, Ezra Pound, Falcon, Hope, Life, Loneliness, Loss, Love, magpie, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Pound, Robins, Soul, Souls, Spirit, Survival, Yearning

I will take a *Pound out of this poem everyday until it is three lines: a title, and 2 lines.

I envy the Aspen,

With her sleek, white body,

She stands unmoved,

While her leaves shake,

Turn color, fall,

And she is left,

Naked and alone,

In wind, rain, snow,

Enduring all,

Judging none,

No complaining.

In spring, I remember

Her limbs rejoiced

In buds, then leaves,

And birds.

They gathered

In her arms:

Robin, magpie,

Sparrow, finch, falcon.

This autumn was summer,

Then winter,

She is bare again.

The chickadees bounce

From perch to perch,

Fully happy in her embrace.

During this too early winter,

When we lose faith,

Fall to our knees,

Barely endure

dark day after dark day;

She stands reaching,

Arms outstretched to the sun

Beyond the clouds.

You must see now,

Why I envy the Aspen,

How she will survive,

And thrive, beyond me.

The Virtue of Aspen

05 Saturday Jun 2021

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

aspen, Beauty, God, Hope, Infinite, Life, Love, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Souls, Unity

The virtue of aspen:

quake of leaves

in soft wind;

you see one tree,

friend,

look beneath,

it’s a family,

a colony

of roots and starts,

a community of rattling souls.

I imagine, if one is cut,

all else will shudder.

Things Poems Can’t Explain

08 Monday Apr 2019

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

≈ 7 Comments

Tags

aspen, Divorce, Hope, Loss, Love, Masochist, Metaphor, Pain, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Survival, Violence

I searched metaphors to describe you,
the aspen’s branches beating against themselves,
waving for help, like desperate arms,

but that was the work of the wind.

The coyote, who devoured all except the head,
and what appeared to be a shoulder
of our girl cat, and left her among the weeds,

but that was the work of hunger.

Then I thought, maybe the foal,
when they drove off with his mother,
her whinnying, more distant and more distant,
as he crushed his tender body against the rails,

but that was the work of love being torn away.

No, in the end, I came up empty explaining
your helplessness against self-loathing,
our loss of hope, and leaving,

but that, it seems now, was the work of surviving–
surviving the things even poems can’t explain.

Second Birth

29 Friday Mar 2019

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

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Tags

aspen, Aspen Trees, Beauty, Courage, Death Poems, Dying, Hope, Life, Love, Love Poems, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Soul, Spirit, Spring, spring poem, Survival, Women's Poems, Yearning

early spring,

a cold aspen, clothed

in soft buds, robed in white,

like ash, born of snow;

to touch her is to quake

with the anticipation

of a thousand leaves

desperate to unfold;

a thousand leaves

desperate

to unfold you.

The Secret Song of the Dead

07 Monday Jan 2019

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Poetry

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Tags

Afterlife, aspen, Aspen Trees, Conversations With Maggie, Death, Death Poems, Dying, Eternity, Happiness, Heaven, Hope, Infinite, Life, Loss, Love, Maggie, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Souls, Spirit, Winter, Winter poem

Looking back, I see you

looking back, smiling,

I say your name,

as if to summon

the dead to life,

and it works,

for a moment.

It’s winter,

and the earth feels

like your absence,

the once living things,

here, but not here.

How many times

did you sit

next to me looking

out at the aspen?

And now, here it is

bare again, waving

its naked branches again.

Today, it looks like

it’s doing The Twist,

and, I think, it hears

a song I don’t, no,

a song I can’t, hear.

Looking back, I see you

looking back, smiling,

your secrets, a dance,

a song that plays

while the world listens,

and twists to a secret melody,

it cannot hear.

A Brew Of Buds

25 Sunday Mar 2018

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Uncategorized

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Tags

aspen, Aspen Buds, Aspen Trees, Balm of Gilead, Healing, Olive oil, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Poplar Buds, poplar trees, Spring, Toads

We acclimate to early spring,

Wind, rain, and fifty degrees,

Chopin’s Nocturne in C sharp minor,

Because the world is opening to us,

Like the gentlest of heavens.

Poplar buds, sticky with resin,

Ready to be picked from their branches,

Mixed, and set aside to ferment in oil.

A balm for brokenness:

Stir together early spring toad-sound,

Coming to us from a darkened pasture

Where it overflowed with melted snow

And rain, a pair of killdeer nesting

Out by the north fence among the dry grasses,

And the aspen, still bare, but breaking in buds.

Riding Through a Grove of Aspens

24 Saturday Mar 2018

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Uncategorized

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

aspen, Aspen Colonies, Aspen Trees, Forgiveness, Horses, Love, Love Poems, Poem, Poems, Poetry

The sweeping of our horses’ manes

Showed us the wind, and which way it blew,

But it was the aspens that gave it voice.

Swirling leaves,

Like erratic wings of butterflies,

Shimmered, shook, slapped,

Simultaneously clapping as we passed.

Grace in the grove, the ticking,

whispering clatter of the breeze,

Passing, back and forth, between worlds.

Fear

22 Thursday Mar 2018

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Uncategorized

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Tags

aspen, Brook, Chimes, Death, Early Spring, Fear, Night Terror, Nightmares, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Roses, Spring, spring poem, Unknown, Willow, Wind

I’ll describe early spring,

because it’s easier

than describing fear:

waking at one a.m.

in a terrible dream.

Where are you?

Why don’t you answer?

It’s forty degrees,

and the wind is rattling

the darkness and the chimes.

Everything is touched:

the willow, the aspen, and the roses

just beginning to break

into the tiniest buds.

Yet, still bare, still silent,

still waving their branches,

like I see you, waving your arms.

The Aspen’s Happiness: First Day of Spring

20 Tuesday Mar 2018

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Uncategorized

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Tags

aspen, Aspen Trees, Bird Poem, Bird Poems, Birds, First Day of Spring, Loneliness, Love, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Robin, solstice, Spring, Winter, Winter poem

I think the aspen is happy today,

The way the robin perched

On its bare branches.

The skin of her feet,

The skin of that branch,

One warm body pulsing blood,

The other pulsing with spring sap.

To be touched after so long,

As your buds begin to break

The surface of what separates:

Your ability to drink of the sun,

And that long and naked loneliness.

If Snow Could Form Into Tree

24 Saturday Feb 2018

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Uncategorized

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Tags

aspen, Aspen Colonies, Aspen Trees, Dreams, God, Mothers, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Shades of White, Spirits, The Perception of White, White, Winter poem

If snow could form into tree,

It would be the aspen.

Snow, one of a thousand

shades of white,

The perception of light and brightness–

And Spirits, rising up like like colonies,

Covered in it. The snow. This aspen.

Our hopes. Our dreams. The good dreams,

That is. The ones where fairy god mothers

Float down and save us.

Did you know, aspen bark heals?

They say it takes away pain–

Like a friend, a lover, my mother

rubbing my back until it burns.

And, like a child, that’s what I want it to be.

Yet, its naked trunk rises like winter–

So unafraid, so unalone,

So rigid, intractable and distant.

Yes, if snow could form into tree,

It would be the aspen,

And the cold, white stillness of what seems

A winter that won’t go away.

Will I Wake In Spring?

20 Tuesday Feb 2018

Posted by Linda R Davis Poetry in Uncategorized

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Tags

Aging, aspen, Poem, Poems, Poetry, Spring, vulnerability

I said the aspen was naked,

But maybe it’s me that’s naked.

The older I get,

The more naked I feel,

Like the aspen stripped by winter.

Its bare limbs standing still

In the fog, are they my limbs?

How terrifying!

How vulnerable!

How lonely!

Will it wake in spring?

Will I wake in spring?

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  • I Envy the Aspen’s Sleek Body

Recent Comments

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