By Carol St. Ann
Circle, you leafless trees,
shed of autumn's dressage.
Lift limbs; embrace the breeze,
rapt with heaven's message.
Lay bare your naked bark,
and wave to passing clouds;
a shadow, cold and stark,
still standing ever proud.
Beneath the starlit skies
a gentle, rumbling sway
rustles like midnight cries.
Alas, it's how you pray.
The winter-sweet repose
fuels springtime's joyful burst
when green bud forms and grows,
and rains quench newborn thirst.
CSA, 2011
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I am pleased as punch to share the news: This poem received First Place honors in the 76th Traditional Poetry Contest.
REVIEWS:
"The Barrenesses is a poem with a lyrical quality that aptly describes the trees in a wintry state, praising their creator. It is beautifully written and rolls sweetly off the tongue, leaving the reader with an enchanting flavor to chew on for a while."
~~ "Critic Quotes Review"
"In going through your portfolio initially, this was the first piece that caught my eye - the exceptional title, the multicolored preface, the stark yet beautiful photograph with the absolute perfect perspective for this piece.
The poem's structure itself is excellent, adhering to six-syllable quatrain stanzas in a 4x4 presentation. The tone speaks as if a call to arms from the author or the naturalist observer - one that has spent time among these trees and knows them well, appreciates them, beckoning them to new heights of poetic piety. Excellent development.
Your third stanza, "Beneath the starlit skies..." was most enjoyable for me, as I myself have found many a respite with Orion high in the sky, shining bright through the reaching limbs of these majestic, dormant titans of symbolic creation.
My only concern with a poem this eloquent, naturalist, perhaps even druidic in its equation of trees with holiness, is that it might find a very limited audience in the populace as a whole. If it were a work of mine, that would be all the more reason for me to go as far out of my way as possible to promote it...but I have a knack for finding and stubbing buttons when and if I can. I think in a specifically targeted setting, this would certainly do quite well, and it certainly performed well for this reviewer, indeed.
~~ "This is Why We Write, A Drew Review"
"Perfection in meter and rhyme, and a beautiful statement in reality and metaphor.
~~ Desi MacDaniels
