Bradford Pears in Early Spring

Bradford Pears in Early Spring

By: Jonathan Garren

When Bradford Pear blooms fall in early spring,

Snow petals twisting in the four winds’ bellows,

A chorus of songbirds minutely sing

Of once vacant nests filled with newborn sparrows.

The scent of wild onions weaves through the air,

Mixed with the redolence of yellow bells

Wreathed like a braid through your curled, chestnut hair.

And in your smile my discontent dispels

Winter’s final fatal freeze, covering

The last limbs of unwilling buds beneath

A crystalline dew of tears left smothered

By a Bradford Pear’s seasonal bequeath.

Still, every season’s change brings brighter skies;

Snow petals lost in cerulean eyes.

The Warmth Between Whiskey and You

The Warmth Between Whiskey and You

By: Jonathan Garren

The snow fell in a slow rage

Like Kamikaze pilots

In the dim, yellow street light.

Dark asphalt and brown fields came

To life with a pale brilliance

Like the mirrored reflection

            Of a full moon night.

As day breaks behind the blue-

Ridge backs of giants, the snow

Slowly bleeds the sky’s color

From brilliant hues to a steel

            Gray of ambivalence

The flakes swirl restless and wild

Like a flock of translucent

Birds in the wind, alighting

In fallow fields blazed brown by

Winter’s kiss; the snow collecting

On dead shoots of panicum

            Like a thousand tufts of cotton.

I stand there alone among

The electric mist of white

Noise as each flake dies violent

And cold against my wool hat,

Watching as the empty promises

Of winter fall at the fury

            Of a jealous spring.

Wrapped in the cold I have come

To know, I watch the snow fall

With a silent barrage and

Wonder if I will ever

Find the warmth I felt between

            Whiskey and you.