Religious Scholar

Hearing seven-year

Cicadas, we knew next time

I'd listen alone.

Fiery young poetry

Sizzles like a flaming dish

Brought quickly to the table.

It is only after flames collapse

In a lingering glow—

A dark haunting of fire—

That we accept a portion,

Let it cool slightly on our plates,

Savor the aroma’s ascent,

Take its warm body into our own.

                            --Linda Brown Holt

White Deer

Approaching the woods, I met a man.

“You have a camera in your hand,”

He said, “If you are lucky, you will catch

An albino deer where the two paths branch.

I shot it with my cell phone cam,”

He called as I went past, his dog’s long

Leash was dragging in the sand.

White deer, white deer,

In these familiar woods,

Woods full of brown fawns,

Squirrels and chipmunks,

By Martin Lake where once I

Spotted nine blue herons in a row.

But never did I see nor hear

White deer, white deer.

My eyes grew marksman-sharp,

Ears twitched at every creaking twig,

I softly jogged the catwalk planks

To where the paths take separate banks,

Meandering through the trees.

A cardinal’s scarlet caught my eye,

A redcap’s knocking stirred my ear

And in the middle of a grove, a black

Cat licked its paw, but no

White deer.

I never saw the wood so vividly, so bright;

Each branch and breaking bough

Etched on my sight.  My steps grew quick,

My lungs gasped at a fevered pitch,

Eyes darted side to side, and

For a moment, outside time,

I felt the quiver of the wilderness:

For a moment, outside thought,

I had become the thing I sought.

The rain came gentle first,

And then the clouds moved overhead.

I shuddered, and had reached the forest

Edge again.  There was no further thing

To see, to find; the deer had vanished,

Never to be mine.

And so I headed back, but wiser, clear:

For in a sense, I’d seen—or been—

White deer, white deer.

                                     --Linda Brown Holt    copyright 2010

Charlie’s is a mouser’s fur: tight, short, and quick to twitch.

I run my hand from his nape to his tail, and he flails it, like a switch.

His fur is gold as honey, and it paunches by his ears,

And he will let me pet him, long as mice are nowhere near!

The fur of Max is a big cat’s fur: he’s 20 pounds or better,

The black coat bunches all about, so he’s quite a nifty petter.

He lounges on my lap, hangs down, and I’m draped in silky flares,

He tilts his white throat back, and lets me stroke the downy hairs.

Old Dimples is so thin and frail, and yet her coat is gleaming.

Her sides cave in, but her tail is plump, and wags while she is dreaming.

I rub her wooly chest awhile, like velvet to my touch,

 Her fur is lustrous, warm and bright, although there is not much!

A Maine Coon cat is Snickers, whose fur’s a feast of fluff.

He springs about the furniture like thistle in the rough.

His coat’s as soft as down, reflecting personality and charm,

You can feel the purrs right through his coat as he cuddles on your arm.

And then there is the White Cat, who visits me at night.

He comes to me at 4 a.m. when the moon is full and bright.

He rubs against my ankle, and his bristly fur lays low,

He passes by the other cats with paw-steps soft and slow.

I reach down calm to pet him, but my hand drops to the floor,

For he’s a ghostly visitor, and there is nothing more.

Not every fur is tactile: some are but memories

Of soft delights, and dreams that lie, beyond reality.

                                                                                 --Linda Brown Holt

Winter

When Winter comes, nests appear in trees,

Old elms bare their arms like young girls in spring,

Fresh rivers flow through forests filled with melting snow,

Blue herons, feathers tucked, take wing.

We shiver, never more alive;

Warmth is a distant dream

While icicles burst on snow-piled eaves,

And small fish hush beneath a frosty stream.

                                                                --Linda Brown Holt copyright 2010