It’s Sunday again, & still more poetry—another ghazal from yours truly for Original Poetry Sunday. Hope you enjoy this & also check out other possible participants (based on last week) like Sandra Leigh at Amazing Voyages of the Turtle (Sandra's poem is already posted—please check it out here) & René Wing at Yes is Red. Anyone else who wants, please join in, & let someone know so we can check out your work.
Stay tuned—there’ll also be a post this afternoon.
Ghazal 5/23
the electrical chirp of cicadas at 3:00 a.m. a warm
sky swarming with sparks of stars
a time prior to sleep’s invention in the hollows of an
archtop guitar trembling an A six chord thru the f-holes
a time prior to lilacs & the columbine petals’
violet gentle stare the white eye streaked purple
a glossolalia of crickets amongst holly
leaves in a Virginia backyard dusk August 1984
the cigarette smoke growing moths’ wings the
white web lawn chairs the green air asking for grief
the locus of sleep’s invention amidst a
flurry of spectral butterflies grazing the columbines’
eyes—I’m mostly awake—sparks of stars
scintillate thru crepe myrtles prior to meaning’s invention a
blue & green & gray chord plucked on an archtop
guitar in the purple void—a columbine’s eye
lidded in electric night—always sparks of stars al-
ways a time before time was a time after time
John Hayes
© 2009