"wrens" poems
ALL I can give you is broken-face gargoyles.
It is too early to sing and dance at funerals,
Though I can whisper to you I am looking for an undertaker humming a lullaby and throwing his feet in a swift and mystic buck-and-wing, now you see it and now you don't.
Fish to swim a pool in your garden flashing a speckled silver,
A basket of wine-saps filling your room with flame-dark for your eyes and the tang of valley orchards for your nose,
Such a beautiful pail of fish, such a beautiful peck of apples, I cannot bring you now.
It is too early and I am not footloose yet.
I shall come in the night when I come with a hammer and saw.
I shall come near your window, where you look out when your eyes open in the morning,
And there I shall slam together bird-houses and bird-baths for wing-loose wrens and hummers to live in, birds with yellow wing tips to blur and buzz soft all summer,
So I shall make little fool homes with doors, always open doors for all and each to run away when they want to.
I shall come just like that even though now it is early and I am not yet footloose,
Even though I am still looking for an undertaker with a raw, wind-bitten face and a dance in his feet.
I make a date with you (put it down) for six o'clock in the evening a thousand years from now.
All I can give you now is broken-face gargoyles.
All I can give you now is a double gorilla head with two fish mouths and four eagle eyes hooked on a street wall, spouting water and looking two ways to the ends of the street for the new people, the young strangers, coming, coming, always coming.
It is early.
I shall yet be footloose.
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I'll settle for the 6 horse
on a rainy afternoon
a paper cup of coffee
in my hand
a little way to go,
the wind twirling out
small wrens from
the upper grandstand roof,
the jocks coming out
for a middle race
silent
and the easy rain making
everything
at once
almost alike,
the horses at peace with
each other
before the drunken war
and I am under the grandstand
feeling for
cigarettes
settling for coffee,
then the horses walk by
taking their little men
away-
it is funeral and graceful
and glad
like the opening
of flowers.
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Bright flashes of red
Give away the Cardinals.
Chick-a-dee-dee-dee
from the capped visitors.
Warning! Warning!
Shriek the Blue Jays!
Loud as a siren
our tiny wrens.
Crowned with a point
the titmouse displays.
Dressed to the nines
the juncos present before a storm.
Sparrows flock about
White crowned ones too.
Nuthatches scampering
like the squirrels around the limbs.
Brown creeper so shy
round and round the trunk.
Mockingbird flashing white on the wing
singing multitudes of songs.
Crows hold caucuses
along side the road.
Whirring wings buzz
Hummingbird zips on by.
Feathered friends on the wing
Speak to nature's diversity.
Feb 20, 2011
Feb 20, 2011 at 7:52 AM UTC
she writes of the falling days
- knows them well, one can tell
simple things like string
and wrappings
autumn and swallows -
hollow places she has seen
in boxes and photographs
and so it is - the falling days
the number of birds at my feeder are fewer
no more humming, no painted buntings
-only my homies come now, my vato birds, my mijas
the cardinal, both red and green
the nuthatch and chickadee, the titmouse-
all three
the wrens and finches, too-
and the blues still like to bathe
in the pyrex baking dish sun warmed
on a sunny day-serenaded by the mocking
one hopping from grub to worm below
- my usual feathered friends
not caring about the weather-fair or foul
and in the pale blue, a gull still laughs
at the folly of it all-
leaving goes slowly-
a spiraling, a gust of wind-
days slowly graying
shorter, lightly fading
- friends, they go
the falling days, change and leavings
leave me - well, you know...
i see the simple things
that soothe, like string
and wrappings, swallows -
- autumn, you know?
r ~ 10/6/14
Oct 6, 2014
Oct 6, 2014 at 1:58 PM UTC
your boot was turned the wrong way
on the post out by the highway
- sharp toe pointing to the south
away from where you've been
you're no stranger to the rangers
living dangerously on the edge
- sidewinders in the sagebrush
whispering to the wind
the anasazi built this home
stacking stone one by one
- far above the canyon
of petroglyphs and wrens
i knew i'd find you by the fire
talking to the ghosts of smoke and drum
- in the ruins above the dunes
reminiscing with your friends
- reminiscing, reminiscing
on the blue mesa.
r ~ 11/6/14
Nov 6, 2014
Nov 6, 2014 at 8:09 AM UTC
Crow cackle! Crow cackle!
…cackling crow!
Who is this scarecrow and what does he know?
What does he do?
And what does he hear?
What does he see?
Why do birds fear?
Crow cackle! Crow cackle! Cackling crows!
Who is this scarecrow and what does he know?
The scarecrow sees bunnies,
the scarecrow sees squirrels,
The scarecrow sees shenanigans
of little boys and girls.
The scarecrow sees nothing
because he doesn’t have real eyes.
The scarecrow’s just hay, in a disguise!
The bunnies will stop put to him one eye,
they cannot seem to figure out, if he’s dead or alive?
Crow cackle! Crow cackle! Cackling crows!
Who is this scarecrow and what does he know?
And the chickadee and the finches and the wrens and the sparrow,
all want to rest on him but find themselves harrowed,
for his job is to be frightening, fearsome and scary,
…and blackbirds, ravens, crows here-ever are nary.
Crow cackle! Crow cackle! Cackling crows!
Who is this scarecrow and what does he know?
You’ll find him quietly scouting the good farmer’s fields,
If you could speak to him or hear from him, what could he reveal?
Crow cackle! Crow cackle! Cackling crows!
Crow cackle! Crow cackle! Cackling crows!
Eating your corn, tormenting fields that you’ve sown,
In the evenings or the mornings he’ll always be alone.
Squawking and screaming their terrible dread!
Crying at you, calling to you and filling your head,
Always complaining and shouting at your ear.
That field and its corn, is what they hold dear.
Crow cackle! Crow cackle! Cackling crows!
Who is this scarecrow and what does he know?
Protecting the corn fields,
forever in the throes,
Crow cackle! Crow cackle!
…cackling crow!
Who is this scarecrow and what does he know?
Dec 22, 2016
Dec 22, 2016 at 7:13 PM UTC
his essence
cascades across
the grain of my frame;
as his eyes dilate,
imbibing in the beauty
of motion teasing the lull
of moonbeams as it
dabbles
against the infinity
of our minds
beholding
our reflected image
in mirrored composure,
as our delicacy of want
pushes
towards an edge
of lustiness
entwined within
warbled notes
of rock wrens
singing love songs
as they dip
their wings
on early
summer
morn's
my eyes close
as softness of
lips touch upon
mine own; sending
thoughts to lucid
stillness of serendipity
bathing our contoured
frames in dulcetness
aligned within pouted
hunger tasting one
another in unity
kaleidoscopic prisms
alight in our eyes
as the lull of the moon
pulls the ebb and flow
of the ocean's current
as our bodies move
in rhythm with its
motion of each
cresting wave
crashing against
the shores of
our soul's fluidity
burbling in ecstasy
Jun 13, 2012
Jun 13, 2012 at 11:57 PM UTC
This heart that flutters near my heart
My hope and all my riches is,
Unhappy when we draw apart
And happy between kiss and kiss:
My hope and all my riches -- - yes! -- -
And all my happiness.
For there, as in some mossy nest
The wrens will divers treasures keep,
I laid those treasures I possessed
Ere that mine eyes had learned to weep.
Shall we not be as wise as they
Though love live but a day?
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There is room, here, on our winds, for the wings of Sea Eagles to soar
and flitting Butterflies, around the garden flowers,
Barn Owls, white as snow, like ghosts, appearing and disappearing,
Kestrels and other birds of prey, quick as a bullet,
all the wild fowl down the shore, those that stay for winter, and those coming back from Africa, to fish the seas and tides
Finches, Jenny Wrens small like a Bee, and Bees of every family
and of course that lazy bird who lays her egg in another's nest, the Cuckoo, Cuckoo, who we listen out for to welcome spring.
Mar 3, 2016
Mar 3, 2016 at 7:27 AM UTC
The orange fire of morning sky
blazes through birthing branches
green with sprigs of spring.
Wrens announce their intentions
to live this day as a breeze from the west
kicks buds of oak-leaf hydrangeas toward the sky.
A grey bank of clouds fights to claim territory.
Soft pit pats, pit pat across patios, sidewalks and roof-top shingles
forewarn the burst arriving against the earth.
Rain, beloved by some
disfavored by others,
becomes relentless.
Bolts, sharp and direct,
provoke clouds to participate
in the deluge.
Rain, beloved by some
disfavored by others,
shifts gears to softness.
Rain, beloved by some
disfavored by others,
owns the day.
Apr 4, 2014
Apr 4, 2014 at 10:38 AM UTC
She speaks in cherry red
Prunus cerasifera
He whispers falling leaves
Amongst the diving wrens.
Happy tears shed every morning
Before the Lyrebird sire
Starts his lone choir
Ashen pine blue, flame trees
Quiet illumination
Sensual body of Autumn
Jul 14, 2021
Jul 14, 2021 at 4:35 AM UTC
In that age of aged seasons
predating our own's four-square rhyme,
a reasonable jape was hatched
beaked but hairy to a guilt-free Hen
whose humors ran with jaw-slackening
creatures, foul and not at all bird-like.
Soon after its mixed-up cracking,
two prattle-prone Wrens hopped to spread
rumors of an un-chickity chick
and the ungodly origins
of fatherless yowls. Their tittered jeers
found welcome ears, and Mother Hen preened
her babe chased by merciless guffaws.
This Hen was not one to lay
down meekly, and a never stony
tongue rolled out its antidote myth
to a pair of gabby Gulls: "My child
may look not-much, but he's divine
engendered and miraculous born.
Sure he's messy, ah, but you'll see
he'll grow to be, much-much-more than
any feathery tykes your like did bear."
She clucked it so seriously,
who were they to doubt her? The plumed
sniggering ceased. But before another
grateful day could dawn in a hallelujah
glare of right angles, out pecking
up a snack, Mother made eye
contact with an unfortunate Fate
brandishing his lucky-gripped ax.
What of her wonder-why, joke of a boy?
Left alone at straw-pocket home,
waiting for his Hen to return,
he starved then decayed to hollow bones,
and was never thought of again.
Apr 1, 2010
Apr 1, 2010 at 12:43 PM UTC
Unwritten letters flock like vultures above my father as he sleeps,
rewriting themselves as storm-wrecked wrens.
A plethora of apologies too late to be useful.
Anger has become his macabre mask.
Looking to me for release from his guilt
He smiles,
the old smile of my father when he was mine
and I,
and I was his.
Remorse shows; fleeting as a breeze in dreams of sunny days and peaceful times.
We sit watching the clouds transform;
bunnies, puppies, cars, and trains.
The sky is melted crayons, each color bleeding seamlessly into the next.
On my father’s lap I am a princess
Drawing castles and writing stories,
Love spills from my pen, soda pours from his glass.
We run and run through the yard,
around the giant flowering dogwood,
over the patio,
past the flower beds filled to bursting with lilies and daffodils,
shouting and laughing.
Grass grabs at my father’s feet.
I turn, knowing our sport is at its end.
The clouds change, dark and menacing while the sky becomes turbulent as the sea.
Dad yells for quiet.
Everything stops.
Time freezes as I wait for his next outraged outburst.
Like a child I run to him wanting my daddy…
Like a fool I am turned away.
Jul 1, 2010
Jul 1, 2010 at 6:56 AM UTC
Discover me by the shallow of the stream
Where the wind blows as I dwell in a dream
In the heart of wonder I shall delight to find
Pieces of myself through peace of mind
Instrumentals sound as the worries decay
Dawn breaks free as the vibrant leaves sway
Wrens sing cheerfully as though only for me
Emerald for my touch and breath for poetry
Won't think on the doubt that invades my soul
Nor the strife that builds until it overflows
New chances emerge and I can rightly see
I can't always be for others, I can only be
Will depart from here yet I will return fast
Where uneasiness is a thing of the past
Simply need relief from an enduring fight
Solitude worships a tranquil state of mind
Sep 5, 2014
Sep 5, 2014 at 8:23 PM UTC
>¡<
^¡^
^¡^
>¡<
Mourning doves
lament the dawn
The air is filled
with clucking song
Mockingbirds
sing sweet and high
Pigeons reach
to touch the sky
Gamble Quail
swoop low to ground
Cactus wrens
make chuckling sounds
Desert Thrashers
go "tsk, tsk, TSK!"
Flickers pound
the satellite discs
Feathered finches
search the stones
Light as clouds
with hollow bones
I wake up
to symphonic calls
Desert birds...
I love them ALL!
SøułSurvivør
(C) 6/11/2016
Jun 11, 2017
Jun 11, 2017 at 11:03 AM UTC
“Graceless Ravens Envy You,” by Eric Robert Nolan
Revel in apostasy.
You are the black dove, hovering
High in an inklike arc.
Blacker, even, than
coal-colored wolves in onyx lines seeking
quarry at starless midnight.
More ebon, even, than
narrow sable blacksnakes staying
cravenly in shade at noon.
Darker, even, than
murders of crows, newly legion at Autumn, amassing
among saw-wing martins at dusk.
You’re blacker, even, then the rooks.
Graceless ravens envy you.
Remember your rebirth?
The sun rose,
Your birdsong changed and then
the questions flew from your beak
faster even than the wrens?
Faster than you could fly?
For a moment, they rendered
all the world obsidian.
Remember your feathers burning?
Sunlight striking your wings and then
all the slow alabaster there
singing, quickening into
aerodynamic black?
Remember the flock’s suspicion?
Remember your siblings, the nest?
Remember when
all their pearl heads turned
their backlit crowns in morning sun
ringed so thinly in shining ivory?
Their song was interrupted,
Yours was made a query —
empiricism’s aria.
Flustered, they fluttered
at all the low notes.
There were all immaculate;
you were the color of night.
Now you arc alone —
soar and sin and sing,
unrepentant one.
Somewhere an ordinary dog,
awakening from shadow,
howls at the sun.
(c) Eric Robert Nolan 2015
Oct 3, 2015
Oct 3, 2015 at 11:42 PM UTC
The glen where felled men slept
Where the creek’s deep bed trembled, reeled
Where the green ferns, restless, crept
Where the breezes blew, flew, wheeled
Where the trees, the sweet elms wept
Where the gentle red wrens nested
Where the elks, when freed, then stepped
Where the fleet, serene deer rested
Where the scented bells were kept
Where the jeweled, fresh dew met green
The glen where felled men slept,
Where men were never seen
Mar 14, 2020
Mar 14, 2020 at 1:33 PM UTC
There was an old person of Hove,
Who frequented the depths of a grove;
Where he studied his books,
With the wrens and the rooks,
That tranquil old person of Hove.
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Kicking the rusty leaves
crumpled by the tree
seeds and twigs broken off
golden and free.
Polished conkers rest
waiting to be smashed
strung up with string
bruised, soaked and bashed.
Russet apples wither in the sun
pecked at by robins and wrens.
Purple clover gather in the distance
on the hills and glens.
Pears drip from branches
like water from a wooden tap.
Twigs point like a human finger
showing the way to follow a map.
Through the ochre wood and
across the sienna fields.
The gathered sticky corn
piled high that the farmer yields
The Autumn season is pure gold
Raspberry sunset and peach skies.
A woodpecker perches, waits awhile
In the Autumn air then off he flies.
Oct 9, 2014
Oct 9, 2014 at 3:03 AM UTC
*Mother Is A Song
I was born on the wind
swirling through tall trees,
downstream fed valleys
into open, high grass plains
where nights twinkle stars
and days are a warm yellow
because Mother is a song.
I was raised on her voice,
carried by wrens’ wings,
spoken in blue jay chatter
that told of black soil
giving life to African Violets
sprinkled neath tall Sequoia
as each word whispered her name,
cause Mother was a song
and I was born
to be her singer.
She often spoke in violins
sounding like a fast-moving rill
cascading over smooth rock
and deep cello metaphor
dancing gleefully through
the eons old gorge
while oboeing calmly
toward the delta’s sea.
Her seas, symphonies of blue-green
waves playing with whale pod sonatas,
dolphin leaping concertos
as clown fish nestle among coral
listening to tides and meter
where all life began
and now witnessing death.
Mother is a song
and I am born on her cymbals,
loud and angry like thunder;
raised to be her lightning singer.
Mother is a song
no one listens to anymore.
Aztec Warrior/redzone 11.30.16
(NOTE: an ode to the large death of coral in Australia’s Great Barrier Reef due to rising sea temperatures and pollution)*
Jan 16, 2017
Jan 16, 2017 at 12:07 PM UTC
The Miss, Misters and Mrs.,
And the St. Joseph's Sisters,
Made me a Bluejay,
Jay- jaying and soaring
Over Wrens and Robins
Below in five rows.
Teeth marks on Ticondarogas,
Initialed pink rubbers,
Toothpicks and fingers
Solved all those problems.
Sister Lucille showed me Sarnia
On the Neilson Wall Map,
With the Malted Milk,
Crispy Crunch bars staring back.
They looked too delicious,
Her reprimand was contritious,
I'm doing time during recess,
Ninety minutes til lunch.
We stood in a crooked line,
Like a snake, to get marked,
With her drawer a crack open
We'd get a peek at her strap.
Black or red, correctively cold;
Sister Roseangela, we'd heard,
Cried, Quid Pro Quo.
We had football baseball,
And hockey dreams,
Volleyball, basketball,
And funeral teams;
Field Days, Holy Days,
Days needed at home;
Teachers were coaches,
With little time to complain;
But the kids back then
Just weren't the same.
There were skirmishes, fouls,
Strike outs and time outs;
We were sliced white bread,
No rye or whole grain.
We'd march double file
Once a week to the Church,
To genuflect and reflect
At the Stations and Cross.
To confess, get redress,
Display penitent remorse,
Though keeping a secret
From the Confessional box,
A comfort and curse.
Their objective succeeded,
The lessons went deep;
Using the three Rs,
The ABCs, 1, 2, 3s,
To impart and ingraine
How to carry one's cross.
I remember by name
The Miss, Misters and Mrs.
And St. Joseph's Sisters
Who gave their all,
Each day, and always.
They've gone or retired,
But recalled in tranquility
For the life-lessons I admire.
Apr 29, 2017
Apr 29, 2017 at 12:06 PM UTC
Brrrrrm Brrrrrrrm halt, now geared in park
With the brake on, waiting, just for a lark.
Here in immediacy, come out to play
Exquisite blue wrens, at the end of the day.
Leaving their nest in the bushes close by
To examine the scene, for here is a wry
Little creature, we clearly can see
The great disappearer. Invisible he
Will only come out when the car arrives home.
Wherever he goes other times is unknown.
Flutter, flutter, question mark. How can this be?
And what is this hard thing that we cannot see?
Now where is his nest, his wife and their egg?
They must be somewhere in this space that we peg.
Committed to finding what this bird’s about,
And then we will boot him from our garden out -
But such an enigma. There is evidence, sure,
Right there in the mirror, we’ve seen it before.
****
Jan 4, 2014
Jan 4, 2014 at 5:18 PM UTC
Watched over by magnificent ancient trees
though perfectly placed to capture the sun
surrounded by walls of multi coloured ivy’s
there lies a paradise second to none.
Bright vivid colours, shades and hues
only add to the general splendour
yellows, pinks, oranges, reds and blues
colours any artist would be challenged to render.
There are lilies, marigolds, roses and petunias
creepers and climbers racing down and up
geraniums, pansies, lavenders and begonias
grass peppered with daisies and buttercups.
All day butterflies, wasps and bumble bees
work tirelessly alongside one another
relentlessly searching for flowers that please
flitting constantly from one to the other.
A wide variety of flowers, plants and shrubs
burst forth from hanging baskets, flower beds and tubs
providing shelter thus becoming teeming hubs
full of worms and snails, insects and grubs.
Birds rear young nesting in trees and bushes
foraging for food amongst the growing throng
blackbirds, finches, pigeons wrens and thrushes
together creating truly melodic birdsong.
A place that transforms long after night fall
when nocturnal creatures have hunting to do
field mice and hedgehogs from the undergrowth crawl
while the odd wary fox occasionally passes through.
Alas for many the garden becomes just another chore
far too busy to see it can offer so much more
never making the most of the opportunity to see
what a wondrous, thriving paradise a garden can be.
Apr 11, 2015
Apr 11, 2015 at 10:14 AM UTC
A regal nose leads down to luscious lips
A tiny waist yields to imperial hips
The wasp-like figure zips past, fairy-fast
And leaves him dangling in her wake, aghast.
"Like young deer on the mountain-top" says he,
"They rise and fall as shivers come to me.
They rack my soul with conquests sweet as wine,
And raise me up to lofty heights sublime."
She smiles gently; wrens tap tiny dance
Upon her gaze, he looks and finds his trance
Her eyes as blackened hazel, all afire
With love and lust and mirrors of desire.
He reaches out his hand to touch her own
As skin grasps pastel flesh, lets out a moan
As softly she caresses him so light,
Then disappears into the dark of night.
Jun 23, 2015
Jun 23, 2015 at 1:00 PM UTC