Evening in Wisconsin

A prose paragraph inspired by Wal Whitman's "A July Afternoon by the Pond". It's mainly romantic description, based off of Whitman's structure in his essay.

The time-warped tunnel-throated songs of mourning doves--repeated after great lengths of rest--in submission to the quieting yet insistent songbirds' tunes; the painted-eggshell yellow of our star, its orb splintering the neighbor's tall maple, and the translucent backglow in each of the leaves in diagonal chaos by the rays; a barn-red birdhouse swaying like an eye twitch in a breeze that haunts the forehead's smallest sprigs of hair; the sullen green of ferns, lily leaves, and dense bushes so crowded the mass seems to be foaming at the mouth--the painting-like blips of cherry-pie red berries growing humbly in a corner of the yard, to the left of the hidden wood pile, to the left of the pond and the shadowed labyrinth cobblestone, to the left of the smaller maples and lone pine, both of which frown, grumbling, at the berries' laughing leaves and their proximity to the golden glow--the last closing time dances of house finch and chickadee, wings dipping in and out of different-tinted facades like one is adjusting a flashlight's strength; nearer, the smell of nostril-clear air and a family's firepit, nearer, the gnats fretting to and fro in white zig-zags, nearer, the feel of porch wood beneath one's seat--which you couldn't enjoy with the same comfort of hard certainty anywhere but here--nearer, the droop of one's eyelids as southwestern suburbia settles in, and finally, the warmth of knowing its alright to drift off to the dove's bass, for beneath the yawning cream-cheese sky flocked by ash crowns, one is, forever, home.

Reviews

[Chris]

When romance fills a mind - colors have a vividness and sounds a clarity that fills one's existence with the echoes of our feelings and emotions. Time pauses then continues in spurts... and we hear our own heartbleats as our dreams fill behind our eyes.

[Olivia R.H.]

Very true. Isn't that what poetry is all about? It's about being present to every little thing. Also, yes, I am quite romantic when it comes to my native state!

[Chris]

A good and hope-full way to be, Olivia.