The yard half a yard,
half a lake blue as a corpse.
The lake will tell things you long to hear:
get away from here.
Three o’clock. Dry leaves rat-tat like maracas.
Whisky-colored grass
breaks at every step and trees
are slowly realizing they are nude.
How long will you stay?
For the lake asks questions you want to hear, too.
Months have passed since, well,
everything. Since buildings stood
black against sky, rain hissed from sidewalks
and curled around you.
O, how those avenues once seemed menacing!
I know what you miss
sings this lake. Car horns groaning
in rush hour. Sweet coffee. Wind
pounding like hammers. Warmth of a lover.
Crickets humming love songs to the street.
HELLO deborah, I like your poems. I want translate it into georgian langvige.(Summer Nights)
I wish I could write poetry as good as yours, Mrs. Ager. You are my favorite poet. 🙂
The good thing about Ms Ager’s poem, The Lake, is it’s very realistic. It’s full of life and the message is clear. There’s profound image of beauty in it and the message of hope and life jibes together “A yard half a yard…each step is worthy from, well, anywhere.” Isn’t that great?
A yard half a yard…Thank you Ms. Agers for taking us along as we glanced the past even while you took time slowing down, so that we could looking forward wisely count the steps still left us as we approached “The Lake.”
Yes, the best words are to be found in the best place. I find them surrounding “The Lake.”
Although I do not as yet consider myself having reached the autumn of my life I can not help but appreciate the reflections your retrospective wisdoms shared.
Fall is indeed the season for those preperations learned from earlier springs, summers. Those offers granted others, clothes… years.
A yard half a yard…each step is worthy from, well, anywhere.
There is balance in the slowing down. Now we can peek over shoulders, still, while moving forwards.Careful not care-worn.
A yard half a yard, one step left then ones foot
tests…Their own unique, lake waters.