A smoky glitter emanating from a fire,
stirred and stoked from flames as I admire
pulling misty conflagrations in my sight.
These shuffling sparkles fight with stars for focus now at night.

Opening salvos resonate unspoken tongues,
and golden tickets don’t always sing what one becomes.
Dancing bees regard me with a little gaze,
for I am not a flower or a gathering of bouquets.

Neither do I seek what’s meant of snags that drag me slow.
Efforts crafted nimbly well succeed in legato.
But an artist’s eccentricities stand out
like sand verbena after rain ends desert drought.
These purple blossoms on desert floors
flash life/disintegrate, but something more,

The dust of aged whispers, ghostly to be sure,
might only be conversant in myths and refutation of the obscure.
A beauty speaks some truths, as the nighttime fireside gleams.
This can hardly be the fruit or grains of my muse dream.

The fire has smoldered and ashes pulse and glow,
my thoughts of poetry fade in pianissimo.
Now berries of a bitter kind are hulled,
and I partake of all the sweetness I can cull.