Tanita threw out this challenge: A villanelle on a wintry topic, including a pair of words (or homonyms thereof) from the following: bleak, draft, gutter, chill, chime, glitter, gust, harsh, rime, nip, thaw.
Brrrrrr! A chilling task...and yet...faced with this, I ended up with....
...a love poem. How'd that happen?
How close
How close are we to ice and avalanches?
Far! Far! These are but gusty jabs and powder stings;
for kiss of starling’s tail knocks snow from branches.
Landing there, in tree still quick with green, he stanches
this dusting of winter’s rime, and clears himself a seat.
How close are we to ice and avalanches
if tree, armed in white, shrugs? forgoes stern glances?
offers us, again, shelter for embraces sweet
while kiss of starling’s tail knocks snow from branches?
We laugh, walk on, our linked arms a pair of flanches
circling our summer hearts, which shudder and beat.
How close we are! To ice and avalanches,
we seal our eyes; instead, swear love. If then winter blanches
pale our days, rosy still our shielded heat.
How close we are to ice and avalanches!
Yet kisses knock snow from branches.
---Sara Lewis Holmes (all rights reserved)
My Poetry Sisters' glittering poems can be found here:
Tanita
Tricia
Laura
Liz
Poetry Friday is hosted today by Tabatha Yeats' The Opposite of Indifference.
