The ghosts of the plane trees
by Andrea Ferrari (aferrari@stmari.edu.ar)

tree stumps line the street on both sides
disjointed lopsided limbs lie
felled out as from a man that still stands
in body trunk silence observing its carnage
in pieces of a puzzle now impossible

cars that need more street
side indifferent

didn’t hear the grind spray of
sawdust in spurts or each thump
as it grunted on dry grass

but at night their ghosts rise
thin translucent holographic
towards a dark heaven

ghosts arms upwards in neon white
transparent leaves in innocent
carbon dioxide shine

couldn’t hear if roots murmured growth
or were whispering of soil silence
when machines came and removed stumps

 

 

Seven Weeks Later

Stepping out door
After stay-at-home rule,
The only thing new seems
Added folds and furrows
On our face.
We turn back
With caution,

Keep on
Looking into the field
With the usual greens,
In hopes to find
Unusual one
Elusive,
Right magic suspended
In the game of
Elfin spring.

Oh, but even this ill-flow will
Fade into the blue sea of past.
We will then reminisce the
Warmth and beauty we’ve held
For one another
In the dark season.

©Byung A. Fallgren

 

 

A week late but The Weekly Avocet is here.
Thank you, Charles, for publishing my poem,
Spring Reunion in this issue.
Please feel free to click on the link below and
enjoy the reading.

The Weekly Avocet – #387

–Byung A.

 

Particular Afternoon Lake

In the silent pause of a dame
She embraces the occasional
Rhythmic pecking of a woodpecker,
Distant hums of a boat.
She wonders, how’s everything,

Beneath the still water
Mimicking the halted time
Of the pandemic,

Listens to the sound from within,
The sound, unusual beat of the heart,
Movement, stealth of
An old man.

From afar, a gull cries,
Like a whimpering child,
For the granny in distress.
A jumping fish teases a little
Duck swims by, like
A fun-loving gaffer pinches
The butt of a girl and smiles.

 

©Byung A. Fallgren

 

 

 

 

To be Carefree for the Day
(Reblog)

Now and then, we resort to our favorite
Observation point,

To clarify the thoughts that tend to
Scatter away, like petals in the wind,

Today, we even forgot why we were here,
Enchanted by the songs of the pastel clouds,

Might as well, let us be a carefree soul for the day.

 

©Byung A. Fallgren

Kentucky River Junction
From Collected Poems by Wendell Berry

Clumsy at first, fitting together
the years we have been apart,
and the ways.

But as the night
passed and the day came, the first
fine morning of April,

it came clear:
the world that has tried us
and shadowed us its joy

was our bond
when we said nothing.
And we allowed it to be

with us, the new green
shinning.

*

Our lives, half gone,
stay full of laughter.

Free-hearted men
have the world for words.

Though we have been
apart, we have been together.

*

Trying to sleep, I cannot
take my mind away.
The bright day

shines in my head
like a coin
on the bed of a stream

*

You left
your welcome.

* Wendell Berry is a poet and novellist.

 

 

 

Some shadows
Reflect their origin,
Like an honest child,
Some play tricks
On our eyes as

These books on the desk
Cast shadows on the wall,
Stirs a fantasy in  our psyche,
Plays on the riddle.

Is the teen pumpkin thief,
Just because he’s been roaming
Round the pumpkin patch in the dark
On the eve of Halloween?

The shadows of the tree branches
On the wall, the red veins,
The spider web of the road to the truth.

 

©Byung A. Fallgren

Night Song 
by Andrea Ferrari
(aferrari@stmary.edu.ar)

trees were singing a song
last night
a swishing and a swinging
song of wind on tangled hair
running fingers through dark green
sheets flapping on the line
of the sky
which listened
(we all listened)
rooted deep in blankets of brown silence
to their night song

in the morning the window told us
it was a water song.