PONOS was the personified Greek spirit of hard labor and toil. The wide, gravel path snaked through a scrub meadow joining two working-class neighborhoods. Every kid in the neighborhood walked it ... [+]
Pale, ivory petals glimmer
in the light piercing
through thick fog at dusk,
where branches trace shadows
on pebbles and tendrils of a vine
entangled around an iron trellis
in the night. The parasol flowers
with patterns etched by hornworms
filter amber light in the morning
but will soon yellow
before swirling down to burrow
in soft soil. Poisonous seeds
follow suit, piercing the subsoil,
before beginning a new climb
up a different trellis than the last.
Blossoms - trumpets announcing
dusk's forthcoming arrival -
burgeon in the night
under the eyes of owls
and close into conch shells
as the sun rises.
in the light piercing
through thick fog at dusk,
where branches trace shadows
on pebbles and tendrils of a vine
entangled around an iron trellis
in the night. The parasol flowers
with patterns etched by hornworms
filter amber light in the morning
but will soon yellow
before swirling down to burrow
in soft soil. Poisonous seeds
follow suit, piercing the subsoil,
before beginning a new climb
up a different trellis than the last.
Blossoms - trumpets announcing
dusk's forthcoming arrival -
burgeon in the night
under the eyes of owls
and close into conch shells
as the sun rises.