Growing Seeds Of Winter Poem by Felix Bongjoh

(i)

Winter is cruising
back with seeds
for a progeny
of wiry gyres of trees

that no longer grow
into leafy heights,

but stand out
shouting in taupe
and umber
stretched arms

dressed in lanky
sleeping skeletons
crowned
and wreathed
by brown dripping leaves.

But the trees are born
clothed in cots
of shivering
green leaves breaking
under spanks of wavy air.

The seeds sprout
into Brobdingnagians
quickly bowing
to sheers and scissors
of winds and breezes,

as they wave
only few
green ribbons from specks
of staying leaves

scrolledto brittle
cylinders,
withering and fading

before a wedding
with the brown confetti
ofrolled
ripped leaves fly in

with cream flies
born of pupa cocooned
in snowflakes.

(ii)

The seeds spring up
into bleached praying
mantises
or daddy long legs
on walls of air,

as other skipping
insects
grow with cream
scales of self-piloted
snowflakes

seeking a home
for cotton and daisy ghosts
sprung off
from winter's bleached
rolling air.

How a new season
skips in with rakes
to rip off
all the green and emerald
fruits of leaves

planted and raised
by a decamped
Mother Spring hugging
all children

of gliding, slipping time
melting off
before we grab it.

(iii)

But all green gold
unharvested
in old spirals now spins

in the flamy cold
of winter
burning leaves into scrolls

that break into
goldenrod specks
without
unfolding life's
chlorophyll messages

that bloomed
across pages of air,
but wentunharvested
by folks

now bowing to coals
in red-eyed hearths
wrapping up eyes
not only from winter's smoke
and ash,

but from the warm fog
and mist of a fireside
without a cradle
for whimpering babies
nestling into broken chests.