Afternoon has lost its fierceness...

Afternoon has lost its fierceness…

Afternoon has lost its fierceness like the death of summer grass, dry and crackling underfoot.

Dappled shadows fuse, separate, and coalesce—grayly shifting furtive forest animal.

Faintly the wind rises, gently kicking into circular motion fronds spinning in the liquid eyes of ponds.

Branches wave back and forth, swings, doors opening and closing, leaves entering and leaving.

Black asphalt roads glow, windswept dark coal fed by hot billows firing an old bronze censer.

Orange cats, writhing, lithe, play on jade grass, shiny crabs jostling, toys scattered at day’s end.

Trees, outspreading dream catcher nets, poise against the horizon, tracing graceful fractals against the sky.

Daylight reddens, crushing pink roses against white cheeks of clouds.

Weakening, the hour bathes in vermilion blooms drifting in the darkening ocean.

Threatening black outbursts, thick clouds close to shore migrate toward the sun now deepening crimson with fatigue.

Remotely, obscured by a diaphanous curtain of rain, boats fade in and out, motes on a planetary visage.

Pummeled by distant turbulence, outlying storms, swirling fists, hurl violently into a far constellation.

Originally published in Journeys Along the Silk Road (Lost Tower Publications, 2015), page 49

Afternoon has lost its fierceness...