nature

OCHRE DANCING

/ deuxiemepeau / 7 Comments

 

Porcelain
plant pot
plots
the delicious decay
of decadence
once eyed as ochre
dancing
next to dandelions
in the dawn’s dew.
Pretty
painted picture
of plants
in a porcelain pot
plays with the presence
of past
and present
under the preservation
of pressed paint.
Gold garnered
by the grace
of the sun,
amber’s earthiness
on route
to autumn’s rust,
careful creation
caught
on canvas,
a fragile folly
frozen
before
the fall.

   

Words and oil painting by Damien B, Donnelly

23rd poem for National Poetry Writing Month

PURPLE CLOUDS

/ deuxiemepeau / 13 Comments

 

In that garden
of the many meadows of my mind

plants grow down
from purple clouds

carved of cotton catchable candy

and seek substance
from the surface
and not the ceiling.

In that garden
of the many meadows of my mind

fences are painted
with faces familiar

and mouths to catch kisses if you’re quick enough

and embraces
sprout like brush
to cradle comfort.

In that garden
of the many meadows of my mind

music spreads like ivy
a chorus to cut the chaos

and a crescendo of colour like a flower unfolding.

—

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

6th poem for National Poetry Writing Month

GREEN GARDEN

/ deuxiemepeau / 3 Comments

 

 

Behold the delicate daffodil,
spirited squirrel,

moist moss of early morning in green garden,
towering tree thriving through winter,

the peace that dawns with the dust,
the blue sky afloat on still water,

absorbing, reflecting, meditating,

the simple root the river runs,
the rustle of the red rose tipped with thorns,

the flowering moonlight over stony soil,
the secrets Spring’s sun whispers to Summer’s stock.

Behold how nature nurtures

while man disappears beneath his own destruction.

Behold how much there is to learn from.

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

4th poem for Nation Poetry Month 2019

IN THE PEACE BY THE PURPLE PETAL

/ deuxiemepeau / 2 Comments

 

Lather us in lazy,
let us lick the honey
from the purple petal,
let us lay down dreams
upon the velvet veneer
of the plump peach,
slip us into a dream of sleep
where all language is lulled
into a lake that lingers
in stilled thought
that tickles tongue upon first taste
with the truth of who we are,
where we shed the red thorns
that have twisted flesh
and bequeath our blues
to the bed at the bottom
to form a base as we rise
in a garden of purple pride
as honey pours
from our once starved lips.

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

1st poem for National Poetry Writing Month 2019

RESILIENT

/ deuxiemepeau / 4 Comments

 

Dry earth,
its sharp teeth
tear through trunks,
spines spindle around nature’s tenacity;
this rugged rage of rocks that have rolled,
boulders are the big bands here
spotlight of sandy sun bolts
and center stage dawns
of desert dust.

Dry earth,
cutting clouds like carefree-cotton
fall apart amid the peak-like pinnacles
that places people as unimportant pebbles,
we can climb the heights, we can slip our soles
along the sandy tracks others have thread
but a simple sandstorm leaves us
as a mark once made,
fast forgotten.

Dry earth.
Still. Silent.
Shining. Steady.
Bare breath is borne off on the breeze,
beauty is breath taking where the breath is less
and beauty is everything.
Steady. Shining.
Sill. Silent.

Dry Earth,
but so relentlessly
resilient.

 

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly

Photographs taken last week in Joshua Tree National Park, Yucca Valley, California

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BEFORE THE SONG

/ deuxiemepeau / 7 Comments

 

Cold clouds burrow beneath the forest,
the spirits have taken cover,
peace and fruit now buried
beneath a bed of lichen,
summer’s rose too ruined to redeem,
her last scent is now a dream.
Love has been lost here too
on a wind that wandered
from wondrous to winsome
beneath a bed of burlap
that burrowed the bone
down to brittle.
Neither body no longer a bucolic bounty
in this season of saturation,
blue is in bloom though not
as calming sky or comforting wave
but icicles bending branches
into less fertile fields. Less.
Not more. No more.
The fall has been frozen.
Cold clouds burrow,
clouds burrow into the cold
beneath the forest bed,
beneath the bodies
digging in these frozen fields
for the sound of the cycle being sung
in a distant spring not yet sprung.

 

All words and photographs by Damien B. Donnelly