The Single Blade

/ Liz H-H
Yellow autumn leaves

Credit: Dreamstime.com

…Bows and trembles still,

But wind punishes, more likely to cut

Than caress and quicken the hopeful green of early months.

Pulsing chlorophyll sparking, breathing deep

The sinewy length of sultry Midsommer.

Samhain-sharp sun leaches its brittle length to liminal pale.

It crosses over, anon.

Soon silent white death shall cover all,

But waken it screaming in mid-winter thaw,

To die again and again, die deeper and harder.

Or simply spread a counterpane, softening nightmares,

To sweeten collective memories of family, dancing in a summer breeze?

As trees above shower color below, the single blade lies down and dreams.

© Liz Husebye Hartmann (2023)

Carrot Ranch Prompt (09/26/2023): In 99 words (no more, no less), write a story that includes a blade of grass. What can you compare it to? Or in contrast? Is it a character prop or a story linchpin? Go poetic, go any genre or tone. Go where the prompt leads!

21 thoughts on “The Single Blade”

  1. Pingback: A Blade of Grass Collection « Carrot Ranch Literary Community

  9. Maybe I won’t make sense, but this poem, Liz, can only be fully experienced by the fireplace, winds howling outside… and an armchair, because you won’t be standing by the end of it!
    (I still like, very much so, the way your brain synapses fire away)

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