Awakening in January

Well, the winners of Writing East Midlands’ very first Aurora Poetry and Short Fiction competition have been announced. I submitted this poem but it wasn’t even commended. Better luck next time!.

 

In the small hours,

Winter skies are clear and vast;

Countless clusters of stars

Span present, future and past.

On the first morning of the year

The garden lacks motion;

Everything holds its breath

In awkward expectation.

Tracks of thorny wire lean

Towards the early bright,

Tangled in tufts of grass and ice.

Soaked by slow, weak rays of light,

The cold fence gives up the fight

And sags a little more.

Early birds swoop and dive

In the pulchritude of sky,

A tepid aquamarine

In the saddest of seasons.

Nature could not wait

To meet the early catkins,

While tips of snowdrop

And daffodil shoots

Give tulips hope.

Sunlight splinters the skin,

The membrane of water

That keeps energy in,

Allows light to ricochet,

Blazing a dazzling way

To the edge of the pond

And into January.

 

© Kim M. Russell, 2016