The Myth

You sniff the breeze and feel the difference,

Something new is coming on.

Green was your life,

it was around you and among you.

There were rumors of other colors, out there,

but you were sure they were a myth.

But now, what is this--

brilliant red leaves are appearing

out of your once green ones.

Neighbors all around have become

orange, brown, variegated gold.

Ecstatic color is waking up, and

you discover

you never even knew what color was 
until there was change.

©2015 Donna Jo Wallace

shared with Poets United / Poetry Pantry 326

The Next Season

Faded brown leaves, dry as ash
crackle under my heels,
swirl anxiously around my ankles.

I look up at branches, clearly visible,
and wonder if my old maple misses her leaves,
feels a little exposed without them,

or, if just before she dropped them,
she worried about letting them go.

Do you wonder, old friend, at what rash thought
made you shed your lovely coat all at once;
do you wonder, sometimes,
if you should have saved a few back, just in case?

Now that birds are on the move, and flowers scent the breeze
do you worry, that your last leaf has come and gone,
that you have nothing left to give?

So I will bring my book, sit under your branches,
and wait a while, with you.


©2008 Donna Jo Wallace
shared with Poets United / Poetry Pantry #315

Freckle-Face

Summer sun is bringing them on
like so many tomatoes on the vine.

These are my little spots,
the ones that follow my home after a day in the sun. 
I used to think of them as bits of beach that stay.

New constellations emerge, like stars in a country sky - 
some new and faint, some gaining confidence,
others always and steadfastly there.

Now and then I remember my freckle-faced first grade teacher,
the one who said she took hers off and night and put them on in the morning, 
who declared them as beauty marks and wore them with pride.

I never thought of them as a blemish
as, sadly, I've heard some women do. 
I never had a chance to. 

I don't think of them much at all until summer comes,
then they pepper me up, and say 
hello.

© 2016 Donna Jo Wallace
shared at Poetry United / Poetry Pantry #313

The Fires Fly

Long ago I discarded the idea

that the backsides of these little insects

contained the fire their names promised.

Still I let them delicately step

across my hands,

wonder at their magic,

respecting them

above all other six-legged creatures,

pets for an evening, then wild once again.

Now I look, caught by surprise

by the field of fireflies before me,

wild, uncatchable, and free.

sparks,

embers of the earth

wild, hot, and fragile

shooting, swirling, sailing

©2008 Donna Jo Wallace

Haiku

All life is absent
Storm clouds gather, loosen, and cry
Sheets of black rain fall

©2010 Donna Jo Wallace.

Winter

Silently it enters

a chill, a flake.

Lacy polka-dots appear in the sky,

gently they swirl, transform the outdoors

into a child’s play-toy

Snowmen, sledding, snow forts

for a while.

Today

frozen into this implacable mass

it does not play or tease.

It glares sternly and bites with Cold’s harsh teeth.

Ice over snow over ice

this white-hard rock

brings you down and pens you in.

Piles of snow in the driveway

grow faster than last year’s garden.

We frost-encrusted Iowans will not claim

to savor this white beauty (much)

but we wait for it always to come

and we wait for it always to leave

and we seek that thing in ourselves

that will outlast it

once again.

©2010 Donna Jo Wallace.

Haiku

Haiku

One small blue green sphere
Gasping for its own fresh air
Spins out of control

©2010 Donna Jo Wallace.