Late Summer

Summer scene, Washington Square Park, Greenwich Village, N.Y. Photo by Howie Lisnoff.

 

Late Summer

You walked on Charles Street in the heart of Greenwich Village, your signature sandals against the wet pavement. Our steps echoed magically within the endless city noise. I thought, too cold for bare feet, but you persevered long into the waning season. Perseverance would become your moniker. These were the days of great change and great hope when idealism and fearlessness were indistinguishable. I look across the room at you today, still beautiful in a world of unspeakable horror and ugliness.

September Station

Route 41 South, Sheffield, MA. Photo by Howie Lisnoff

September Station

September’s country lanes

Had filled with goldenrod and Queen Anne’s lace

Down through the Berkshires and Taconics

To Wassaic Station.

 

There is something that fits a train station in September

You can see both ways

Back into the comfort of summer

And ahead to the promise of cool fall

It is like the reunion and the leave-taking

Illuminated by giant Cyclops’ light of diesel engines

A metaphor for the eternal emptying of life.

Leave-taking

Photo by videezy.com.

Leave-taking

Cool night

Cricket chorus breaks in silence intermittently

Pale full Strawberry Moon rides the irregular edge

Of pine forest

On calm breeze.

 

Forty-six years

You left after sunrise

Slept in beauty and with great intelligence quieted

In those early morning hours

Gentle rise and fall of your breast.

 

Waxing half moon

Climbed over treetops

Evening of

Unbearable aloneness

Like the solitude of summer forest.

Dame’s Rocket

    Photos by Howie Lisnoff

Dame’s Rocket

Dame’s rocket took up residence

Silently

Beside country lanes

And at the edge of newly furrowed fields

Sentinels to the arrival of summer

They will soon disappear

Their hues of purple

Vanished.

 

Seize the day

Everything is emptying endlessly

This beauty and life

Transient.

High Spring

Photo by Howie Lisnoff

High Spring

Mares’ tails

Harbingers of other weather

Blew in from the west/southwest

On crystalline skies

Across the Berkshire Hills in the warmth and closeness of high spring

A perfect natural world amid imperfection.

Renewal

Photos: Howie Lisnoff

Renewal

Cycling into the rising hills of the Berkshires

The new season giving up its ancient secrets

Newly budding distant mountain vistas

Soft and quiet breezes at their summits

Greening willow

Daffodil

The gentle bleating of sheep

At pasture.

March 2015, Undermountain Road, Berkshire Hills

Image retrieved from the Internet on March 14, 2015

March 2015, Undermountain Road, Berkshire Hills

Along the winding country road of the Berkshire Hills

The late-winter rain turned the rolling and snow-laden fields and meadows

Into great foggy phantasms

That distorted the landscape of ancient trees

Creating a closeness that was abiding

And brought ghosts

And memories of long-vanished and transitory beings.

A Perfect World

Photo: Indiginight.com

A Perfect World

A single star in the southwest

And the pale white crescent waxing moon with earthshine

The cool/clear October twilight

A single jet trail

Traversing the apex of the heavens

It is easy to imagine a perfect world in this splendor among these hills.

Open Road/Do Not Try This At Home

Photo: Bumszilla.com

Open Road/Do Not Try This At Home

Brian and I in the heavy summer rain

Drafting

Tailgating tractor trailer/ New Hampshire highway

Night of youthful fearlessness

In the wonder of the White Mountains

Bedrolls lashed to the backs of our machines.

Mountain Memory/Overlook Mountain

Photo: Overlook Mountain Summit by Howie Lisnoff

Mountain Memory/Overlook Mountain

Again, hiking in the Catskills

Autumn tapestry

Red/green/orange/brown

Crystalline robin’s egg sky

Ever upward

Above the Hudson and Woodstock

Indescribable natural splendor

Close as the beating of my heart

An eternal and abiding love in the magnificence of these ageless hills.