A Poem by L. Ward Abel

Pinkorange

 

The sunset colors red brick

behind tall azalea and boxwood

unkempt from someone’s aging.

 

None of these tints stay

the same, imperceptibly range

from pinkorange to reddish bluegreen

then gray to lack of light.

 

Birds sing past and before days.

Wings recede from thermals

and go somewhere to doze

after the evening always with

a memory of poplars, strange dialects,

with an aversion to agriculture.

 

L. Ward Abel, poet, composer and performer of music, teacher, lawyer, lives in rural Georgia, has been published hundreds of times in print and online, including appearing in The Reader along with, among others, British Poet Laureate, Andrew Motion, and is the author of Peach Box and Verge(Little Poem Press, 2003), Jonesing For Byzantium (UK Authors Press, 2006), The Heat of Blooming (Pudding House Press, 2008), Torn Sky Bleeding Blue (erbacce-Press, 2010), and the forthcoming American Bruise (Parallel Press, 2012). A limited edition, short Selected Poetry has just been released through West Virginia College of Law.