A Balcony View

Ever heard of a metaphor? This is like that, only more depressing.

The air is warm

Laden and thick with humidity and things beyond feeling,

Solely being, or a lack of it

Mist and palm fronds speckled with droplets

From this balcony view.

Golden grass in patches is matted and decaying,

Pretty and lifeless in a golden stage.

Contradictions scattered throughout a rain-drowned yard

Murky and glassy, reflective of the sky where it came,

From this balcony view.

Beyond the cedar picket-fence

The trees, the Spanish moss dangling, falling, settling

Rolling into the bay 

Cresting, wave after wave, into the bridge

That meets the hills

That meets the sky and nothing more

Other than a flock of birds

Three fly on and one descends into the roll of waves

Becoming another swell, seemingly, in a dark as shadow sea

Ever-grey but ever-changing

From this balcony view.

Screened in, a weary rocking chair 

Is abandoned quietly

The world is hushed

The three birds disappear into the sky

And one does not return

Rolling, waiting just beneath the surface

Never emerging

Perhaps what it sought does not lie where it goes

But you cannot ask the sea to return what belongs to it

And it is just another way of the world

To the no one that is watching

From this balcony view.

Author's Note

I didn't have to exhaust this.

Reviews

[The Iron Horseman]

Very evocative and thoughtfully done. Sad, but true. The images are haunting and your choice of words is apposite. Excellently done.

[Madeleine Celeste]

Oh, thank you ever so much! I really appreciate your feedback.

[The Iron Horseman]

You are very welcome.