In The Orchard

The way the light bent, breaking through the dead
branches, was like the mist that hisses out
from pesticide containers used instead
of careful fingers, attentive about
such little details like the yellow tips,
diseased and torn, by winter evening's chill.

I wander, aimless, looking up to dips
and curves and twists of brances holding still
against the quiet haze of April sky
and question only fruitless limb and leaf.

And then I think of this, his orchard, dyed
in shades of gray and black, unlike the wreath
of colorful posies and tearful prayer
we laid that day on father's empty stare.

2/95

Tom's Notes:

It's a sonnet. Rearrange the stanzas a bit, take a look at the rhyme scheme and emphasis and you'll see for yourself. Had to write a sonnet in one of my poetry classes and came up with this, after hours of labor and several rewrites. It's about the fictitous death of my father, but in some ways, touches home to deep seated psychological issues involving two divorces. Perhaps. Perhaps not.

Fiction allows us to imbellish and play with feelings we never really have, but sometimes, morbidly, wish to explore.

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