Tag: Royal Rhodes

EASTHAM by Royal Rhodes

~ ONE ART ~ Leave a comment

EASTHAM

Here on the outer Cape
near the last windmill
are scrub pine and sand bars
near tide pools we walked
in ankle-deep warm water,
and found horseshoe crabs,
moon snails, razor clams,
and tangled knots of seaweed.
This is the flung-out arm
of the bay that beckoned
the hungry pilgrims and Nauset
in their first encounter,
where both, surprised,
ran off, over round stones
rubbed smooth by tides.
The gray heavens or clouded
blue air fills with low
flotillas of observant gulls,
as if visiting ghosts
from some invisible realm.
Here understanding grows
and stuttering love
outlasts the soon altered.
In each summer season
mourning doves croon
love from the few trees
with hours wearing away
where we have sat still,
here with the world’s weight
as night comes too soon.

*

Royal Rhodes is a poet who lives in retirement in rural Ohio. His poems have appeared in: ONE ART, Last Stanza, Amethyst, Ekphrastic Review, The Montreal Review, and others. His poem, “Solstice”, was issued as a poetry and art collaboration broadsheet by The Catbird [on the Yadkin] Press in North Carolina.

WHEN IT WAS FIVE O’CLOCK by Royal Rhodes

~ ONE ART ~ 1 Comment

WHEN IT WAS FIVE O’CLOCK

A cloud surveyor is what I became
as the tree line accumulates
darkness and merges.

The land north of here
is geometrically flat,
awaiting the tracking birds
but still seeing itself lovely.

Perhaps it is best not to end
a poem with a memory
or the gradual shift of light –
a space full of erasures.

But if you sit long enough,
something calculates these things
like an equilibrium of breaths.

And that may be the secret –
to wait at the crossroads
where we can watch for hours
seeing each other walk and
approach in the five o’clock light,

where love becomes only a single body,
a language largely untranslated
that keeps its distance, and
promises delight it cannot keep.

*

Royal Rhodes is a poet and retired educator who lives in a rural village amidst the rolling farmland of Ohio. His poems have appeared in: Last Stanza, Quaci, Grey Sparrow, Lighten-Up Online, Ekphrastic Review, The Montreal Review and a number of other journals and anthologies. He has been twice-nominated for a Pushcart prize.