WINTER
DAY
Sometimes
another's poem can directly inspire you to one of your own. One
winter's day I was trying to translate Rilke's "Autumn Day"
(poetry Blog No 160) and was inspired by the oblique way his imagery
suggests more than its surface meaning and feeling. So this was a
modest effort of own, from my own scenery.
WINTER DAY
A
small wind steals pale whispers from the leaves
of
many high trees with soft-swaying crowns.
From
cloud-free sky the winter shine rains down.
And
coated black and white,
some
butcher birds seek perches in
a
she-oak's green-brown robes to sing
and
others take the air's abode with wings
to
ride the distances of light.
Walk
up a little with noon's sun inclined
to
mild, warm beams that soothe the brush of breeze
and
draw on you the cloak of lonely ease;
stand
in the outward view
and
count the hills unclimbed
that
vanish in the endless blue.
