Tag: Poetry About Winter

Rose Mary Boehm: “Discontent”

Posted on by asitoughttobemagazine 
Discontent 

Early spring in the subtropics 
make me wish for that tree, 
fat with apple blossoms, 
a host of humming 
small folk pollinating 
and feasting. 

Closing my eyes, I smell 
again the freshness
of a cool April morning, 
able to call up the seduction 
of feathery blossom fingers 
on my cheeks. 

Would there be felicity 
without caressing 
losses and ignoring gains, 
exalting crystalized narcissus 
early March in the north of the North 
while succumbing to the exotic wiles 
of the glorious cantuta. 

Now in the late years of my life 
I wish for an Indian summer 
instead of a winter of discontent.

About the Author: Rose Mary Boehm is a German-born British national living and writing in Lima, Peru, and author of two novels as well as six poetry collections. Her poetry has been published widely in mostly US poetry reviews (online and print). She was twice nominated for a Pushcart. DO OCEANS HAVE UNDERWATER BORDERS? (Kelsay Books July 2022) and WHISTLING IN THE DARK (Taj Mahal Publishing House July 2022), are both available on Amazon. My seventh collection, SAUDADE, is going to be published by Kelsay early 2023. https://www.rose-mary-boehm-poet.com/

Image Credit: Nicolae Grigorescu “Apple Blossom” Public domain image courtesy of Artvee

Ruth Bavetta: “A Year Turned Upside Down”

Posted on by asitoughttobemagazine 

A Year Turned Upside Down

Almost all of fall evaporated
in a flurry of sun. Mayweed’s stars 
immobilized by an embarrassment of heat. 

Come January, gardenias shot into scent,
clivia burst into a conflagration 
of orange. With winter annihilated,

spring spiraled into the disingenuous 
sugar of summer, sage withered, 
chaparral seethed in a flash of flame.

About the Author: Ruth Bavetta’s poems have appeared in North American Review, Nimrod, Rattle, Slant, American Journal of Poetry, and many other journals and anthologies. She likes the light on November afternoons, the music of Stravinsky, the smell of the ocean. She hates pretense, fundamentalism and sauerkraut.

Image Credit: Chase Dimock “California Mayweed” (2022)

Dan Raphael: “A thread of Winter”

Posted on by asitoughttobemagazine 
A Thread of Winter


sun sends frost into the grass and soil
wind is waiting for the dog to drop the ball 

those late night moments when a stretch of freeway
is empty and resents the next vehicle that comes through
but the road can’t change fast enough to assert its will

other times the freeway is so full and heavy
nothing moves and the earth beneath it
dreams of being a river and swimming inside itself

as the river knows without dreaming that
for much of winter, several threads of frozen water
tangle through it, unable to cohere or slow anything

yes heat rises, but in winter cold starts at the top 
walking to and from high school in winter, i could
generate heat in the center of my chest and have it
flow outwards, never spent enough time in heat
to generate cold, or a wind that trickles out my pores
not breath, a snack I can walk through
legless walking, how this body could fly
and land safely

what if our solar system was too hot
and we needed the opposite of the sun
to make earth cool enough to live on

what if the only places to live on this planet
were at the equator, what new ways
would we divide time, how would we
vary our wardrobes, what would be
peak vacation times, our birthdays
would be our personal new years

what if the only places to live on this planet
were at the equator, would I get adventurous
or systematically imaginative

About the Author: dan raphael’s poetry collection In the Wordshed will published by Last Word Press this November. More recent poems appear in Fireweed, Trampoline, Rasputin, Haight Ashbury Literary Journal and Unlikely Stories. Most Wednesdays dan writes and records a current events poet for The KBOO Evening News.

Image Credit: Ferdynand Ruszczyc “Winter Tale” (1904) Public domain image courtesy of Artvee