AUTUMN
Dusk sets in.
Cool breeze filters through stones on the pier.
Distant lights of the city glare, opposed
By a sun of scarlet and orange
Disappearing through waves
Beckoned by the sand.
Trees nearly naked stand as soldiers
Behind the shore guarding the water
And its unending journey,
Moving only in rhythm with the wind.
Light gently fades
Dimming the horizon to nothingness.
WINTER
Frozen patterns of beauty
Scrawled as nature’s marking.
Crisp leaves of cold
Standing watch over a hardened lake.
Blanketing layers of ice
Coat the shore, silent save for the wind.
A setting sun gives of itself
The last warmth of the day,
A dying time as dark sets in,
Leaving cold bitterness, it drops
Below the horizon,
Chilling the flesh of the Village.
SPRING
Sunset casts its narrow ray across the water.
On the far horizon, the top of a sail slightly seen
With each swell of the waves then disappearing again.
Storm breeze chills at the touch of skin.
Violently waves approach
Battering rocks on the pier.
Breaking high,
Surf mists couples as they watch
Feeling water cling to their clothes.
SUMMER
Sun sets in the west
Where children yearn for their freedom.
Shadows resist the streetlamp’s glow,
Drawing insects in the haze.
Warm and damp, silence shades the town.
Liquor bottles replace the nourishment of mother’s milk,
Graduate potions for the poisonous dark,
Where the children congregate
Awaiting the weekend’s potential.
END OF SUMMER
Help me bring our boat ashore
And stow away the sails.
You’ve shown me trust in a human heart,
And taught how friends can share their warmth,
If only for a little while.
I don’t wish these days to end,
But different dreams we’ve drawn in the sand
And carved in these stoic cliff walls.
We must now follow our separate paths.
Summer’s over, it’s time to part
And return this ship to pier.
Huntington Beach, Bay Village, Ohio is where I attended high school along the shoreline of Lake Erie. The beach was a popular hangout in the warm weather, but in the off-season became a place of solitude and introspection where one could sit for hours and watch the waves with no one else around.
Each stanza in this poem was written during the particular season. The inspiration for this format is seeing Monet's water lilies and other garden-scapes that he painted at different times of day and different times of year to capture the nuanced differences in the environment. It seemed to be a valid approach to show a poet's viewpoint of the same setting viewed under different circumstances. Adding the fifth season was a way to make the piece more unique and not just be talking about times of the year.
The poem includes people in the view during the warmer parts of Cleveland's weather, and no other people when the cold kept the timid and less desperate at home. cheers.