Gulls hunkered down on the beach in the snow - copyright Sharon Pisacreta

Poetic License - Winter


Haiku
The perfectly still
earth, with eyes almost closed,
enters on winter.

----Iida Dakotsu (1885-1962)

Christmas decorations in the home- copyright Sharon Pisacreta
Heap on the wood!
The wind is chill;
But let it whistle as it will,
We'll keep our Christmas merry still.

----Sir Walter Scott
Patio chairs in the snow overlooking Lake Michigan- copyright Sharon Pisacreta
I heard a bird sing
In the dark of December
A magical thing
And sweet to remember.

"We are nearer to Spring
Than we were in September,"
I heard a bird sing
In the dark of December.

----Oliver Herford

Snow falling on trees- copyright Sharon Pisacreta
Orchard Trees, January

It's not the case, though some might wish it so
Who from a window watch the blizzard blow

White riot through their branches vague and stark,
That they keep snug beneath their pelted bark.

They take affliction in until it jells
To crystal ice between their frozen cells.

And each of them is inwardly a vault
Of jewels rigorous and free of fault,

Unglimpsed until in May it gently bears
A sudden crop of green-pronged solitaires.


----Richard Wilbur
Snow falling on the Peterson Preserve - Saugatuck Michigan- copyright Sharon Pisacreta
I think of the trees and how simply they let go,
let fall the riches of a season,
how without grief (it seems)
they can let go and go deep into their roots
for renewal and sleep...

Keep busy with survival. Imitate the trees.
Learn to lose in order to recover,
and remember that nothing stays the same for long,
not even pain, psychic pain.
Sit it out. Let it all pass.
Let it go.
----May Sarton,
Journal of a Solitude

Snow on pine trees in the sun - copyright Sharon Pisacreta
Dust of Snow

The way a crow
Shook down on me
The dust of snow
From a hemlock tree.

Has given my heart
A change of mood
And saved some part
Of a day I had rued.

----Robert Frost
Snow on Oval Beach -Saugatuck, Michigan - copyright Sharon Pisacreta

Low Sky at Dawn

Desolate and lone
All night long on the lake
Where fog trails and mist creeps
The whistle of a boat
Calls and cries unendingly
Like some lost child
In tears and trouble
Hunting the harbor's breast
And the harbor's eyes.


----Carl Sandburg
Geese and ducks on a partly frozen pond - copyright Sharon Pisacreta
On Winter's Margin

On winter's margins, see the small birds now
With half forged memories come flocking home
To gardens famous for their charity.
The green globe's broken; vines like tangled veins
Hang at the entrance to the silent wood.

WIth half a loaf, I am the prince of crumbs;
By snow's down, the birds amassed will sing
Like children for their sire to walk abroad!
But what I love, is the gray stubborn hawk
Who floats alone beyond the frozen vines;
And what I dream of are the patient deer
Who stand on legs like reeds and drink that wind; -

They are what saves the world; who choose to grow
Thin to a startling point beyond this squalor.

----Mary Oliver



Unless otherwise indicated, all Lake Effect Living photographs are the work and property of Sharon Pisacreta.

December '11 - January '12