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Haiku Free Verse Prosies
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In California, it rains all winter.
Right now the hills are blooming green
even as the the colors here are turning
black and white and grey.
"I'm so glad I don't see the world like that,"
you replied, and put me to shame.
Walking to the car that morning, the sky
broke pale blue and pink above me,
soft as eiderdown.
Each year I've walked with Kore
into the underground, dreading it,
hoarse with screaming, flailing my arms.
The fruit turns to ash in my mouth.
All the gemstones in Hades can't erase
the moment when she bent in that bee-kissed field
to pick narcissus, the earth's rupture,
the rape, her mother's sorrow.
But this year is different.
Summer passed quietly and the colors remained.
Even now, in the hardest month of the year,
I pump my legs and swing my arms
under the darkening sky.
The woods are alive with colors —
surprising crowns of orange, yellow, red.
Nothing is dead. Just sleeping.
And such a sleep, full of such dreams
with the light hanging low in the sky,
turning clouds luminous.
I refuse to believe
that this has anything to do
with meeting you.
Frances Donovan
November 1998
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