This Is No Swan Song

Down in my bones, I feel that this year
has not been our swan song.
Though the waves came higher,
and broken reeds were flung
across an uneven path,
we were dazzled by sun-flecked tides.
With the coming of winter,
something else haunts the landscape:
a swan drenched in mud-scent,
alive with the tang of the river.

Kim M. Russell, 16th December 2020

My response to Poets and Storytellers United Weekly Scribblings #50: Down In My Bones

Rommy ‘s here with her last prompt for 2020 , for which she would like us all to think about how we might finish this sentence, “Down in my bones, I feel _____________”. My poem was inspired by an unusual visitor to our garden. I could only get a blurry photograph as I couldn’t get close enough; it was very big and wouldn’t stop moving!

24 thoughts on “This Is No Swan Song”

  1. I HAD to look it up!
    ‘The Swan is a symbol of purity, beauty, grace, love and elegance, but it can also symbolize divination and balance. The swan as an animal totem can also help you understand better spiritual evolution and maintain grace in the communication with other people.’

    Or:
    ‘If swan has glided into your path, she will help you find new ways of thinking, breathing and going with the flow. She asks that you accept your ability to know what lies ahead. Be sure to pay attention to your feminine intuition, hunches and gut instincts. Remember your inner grace and inner beauty. Let it shine forth for those around you to see.’

    The poem suggests you have already worked out that this was a good omen!

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  9. It love the hope spilling out of this poem. It’s hope marred by our circumstance, hope that has gotten its hands dirty but continues to grow, hope that reminds us that even when things are dire the miracles aren’t lost. I feel the same way about 2020. Goodness knows that it has been a monster of a year in more ways than once. But in the end, we are still alive… and being alive implies that we can clean up a lot of the muck and then move forward.

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  11. The swan here too was very muddy and yucky. But we, like the yucky duck, have tried again to get a change of birds, this time I think for a clean and pretty swan. Hoping.
    ..

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  12. I’ve made a little space for the spark of hope that kindled in me, oh in early November. There is so much mud to clean up, so many yards beyond my own that have been hit. But the nice thing about little sparks of hope is that they can grow bigger when we take actions that nurture it. And hopefully lasting change can grow up alongside it. I hope when you see your visitor again, she is cleaner and in her full glory.

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