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Dave Bonta
i watch from under
my umbrella
the complexly bladed ferns
dancing erratically in the rain
my feet and their forever
war on stasis
the ruts reasserting themselves
through fresh stone
i was only going
for a walk and now
i’m pondering the obligations of ferns
the prerogatives of feet
and the way a green tongue
snakes through everything
as if wisdom grew on trees
as if it were made of gray paper
spiderweb
on my glasses
name that tune
lost dog
enchanter’s nightshade burs
in its ears
tick-trefoil reversing
in mid-air
white spears
of black cohosh
an insomniac firefly
waterfall that only sings
when the stream’s a trickle
children’s cries
the holiday sky empty
but for a vulture
among straight ascenders
an ancient grapevine’s
grave accent
the last white asters
the woods are darkest
just before the fall
weak sunlight
witch hazel beginning
to extrude its rays
so green you’d think
it’s still spring
Christmas fern
old corral
two years for horses
47 for trees
too red
half the maple’s leaves
are poison ivy
unchanged
for 180 million autumns
cinnamon ferns
fraying scrolls
illuminated with blue fungi
black birch log
tree branches grow
no lower than deer can reach
woods’ edge
rock piles
from the 19th century
the oak’s massive crown
right-of-way
the power pole all scratched up
by bears
hayscented fern
losing ground to goldenrod
a circling monarch
ark ark
so many ways of saying here
in Raven
the aging spruces
still stand where we planted them
their insurgent roots
rings of mushrooms
between the lines of trees
one woodfern waving
shaggy manes
imagine the sweet release
of autodigestion
After all-night rain,
the forest floor is soft
and full of give.
A birch log collapses
when I step on it, but the bark
arches back after I pass.
New ferns uncoil,
heads slowly dissolving
into spine and ribs.
At midnight
the bobcat stepped
through ferns
to watch the
hickory-bark
fire with me.
Dwarfed by black yews
you pirouette, a ruby shadow
in green arabesque fern.
Twirling like an autumn leaf
you dance in the shade
for a flute of birds.
Beneath a quilt of fern
your breasts bud and flower
I glimpse the wind.
(Unready)
Close-folded fern ...
So stiff; so coldly self-sustained:
But summer passes.
(Motherhood)
Puss watches the world,
Troubled: but knows she is linked
To a miracle.
(Home)
Empty room; fire dies;
Moon shines in; chairs and tables converse;
Books croon songs.
(Awakening)
Gray old tree
Has breasted winter storms; but is vaguely
Worried by March.
As we the withered ferns
By the roadway lying,
Time, the jester, spurns
All our prayers and prying --
All our tears and sighing,
Sorrow, change, and woe --
All our where-and-whying
For friends that come and go.
Life awakes and burns,
Age and death defying,
Till at last it learns
All but Love is dying;
Love's the trade we're plying,
God has willed it so;
Shrouds are what we're buying
For friends that come and go.