Early pale-pink dawn
egret rests at water’s edge
in shut-eyed prayer perhaps
contemplating pleasures
of inviolate freedom.
Of a sudden, flinging
white wings wide-open
he soars into the freshness
of a flawless new beginning.
Photo: Graham Owen
Over at dVerse Poetics, Brian Miller invites us to write a poems using random words offered by a friend or chosen from pages of a book. I chose mine from the poetry of Mary Oliver. I cannot get enough of her work.
The words I happened upon: Nouns–pleasures, egret; Verbs–fly, fling; Adjectives–pale-pink, unviolated; Random–prayer, edge. This is a wonderfully creative prompt. I hope you will join us! They fit a scenario I witnessed this morning!
The flight of a bird is always beautiful !!!
This is beautiful – quite perfectly captured Victoria and a joy to read…
With Bst Wishes Scott http://www.scotthastie.com
How beautiful is this. I love seeing them fly, all legs and broad span of wings, and so graceful.
You wove those words together as adeptly as a weaver takes fine tendrils of fiber and creates a blanket in which to wrap oneself and drift to sleep.
This is soft and full. I love how you’ve captured the moment and the action within the moment. So beautiful, Victoria.
Oh, to live in the moment like that.
Beautiful words and picture.
Beautiful!
This paints such a tranquil picture. And ditto on Mary Oliver. So cool to get the words from her work!
Now here’s the thing Victoria – would you have written your poem quite like this if you’d not had to include those words. I’m asking because I think you would probably have written something very similar without the wordle prompt.
Good point. I do a lot of random selection of words in poetry and find that subconsciously they often create a theme. And since I used a poetry book of Mary Oliver–my favorite poet–I guess I got what I wanted!
Beautifully crafted.
Fantastic poetry. And egrets are beautiful, I saw them all the time during my Florida vacation earlier this year.
Beautiful description of egrets. I love them.
Beautiful capture of that morning moment.
Fabulous images
Beautiful. Just read an article in The Smithsonian about Egrets and women who refused to wear feathered hats because of bird slaughter. So “shut-eyed prayer” and “inviolate freedom” in shoreline relaxation is a pleasure I o not take for granted. It would be. is, perfect indeed.
Herons are sometimes referred to as the “wiseman of the river”, and you’ve captured that with the egret (but when they waggle their legs about in the water, they seem somewhat less sage like to me).
Very refreshing, encouraging, and smoothly done. Superb skill.
Love the mental picture I get from reading your poem: ” freshness
of a flawless new beginning ” – beautifully stated!
…soar into the freshness of a flawless new beginning — what a great & most fitting words to start my day right here… thank you Victoria… and there’s Mary Oliver — my current hero in the night before i settle to bed and in the morning before i dance with my li’l birds feet…. good morning!!! smiles…
This is so heavenly and peaceful, Victoria.
Pamela
we have the great blue heron here and except for the whiteness, your poem would describe them as well, and the way I feel when I see them soaring so effortlessly into flight
beautifully worded, especially the final lines
Sparkling delight stems from this poem. Thank you.
oh i love how you describe him…the shut eyed prayer perhaps..the soaring into freshness of flawless new beginnings..very cool
I like the flawless new beginnings ~ Mary O’s words are indeed inspirational ~ Happy weekend ~
nice…love the thought of him there in prayer…and then flinging himself out onto wing…ha…there is much philosophy of life in those actions…what a beautiful thing to see as well…
“In shut eyed prayer perhaps” – loved this line. Love the movement in your words. Beautiful!
Beautiful, Victoria!