a glass of sweet autumn gloaming

For the dVerse Monday prompt “In praise of the grape“, a quadrille using the word wine:

 

The autumn-sweet air is eucalypt clean,
light, yellow as late-harvest wine, gilds the trees,
insect hum deepens the stillness,
stirred by currawong’s mournful goodnight.

The trees blush rose,
then dissolve
into the darkness rising from valley
to meet an apricot sky,
ripening to indigo.

 

 

cockatoo tree

The cockatoo-tree blooms
at the first touch of light slanting over the ridge.
Great feathered blossoms drop and swoop
 …white against blue
…white against green
…white against black
as they fall into the shadowed land below.
Their screams pierce the morning silence,
waking the sky,
that stretches out now
to reach down to the ground.

 

Inspired by sgeoil’s lines “The sky reached from the ground / all the way up and around“ and Nick’s seagulls.
I dreamt of peacock feathers and woke up to see the first rays lighting up a dead tree full of cockatoos, unbearably white against the blue sky. Here on the western side of the ridge the early morning sun lights up the tree tops, leaving the land below still in shadow, until the earth turns towards the day and the sky reaches down.      

hawk

This is for Frank’s Haikai challenge #176: Hawk, and also in response to Dwight’s “The King”.  

 Hunger rides the wind,
watching for the flicker of
small life far below. 

fledgling III: rosella

Flanked by an escort
in full dress uniform
– blues and brilliant red –

the cocky

Cocky, cocky screaming loud
sulphur crest raised high and proud,
what immortal hand or eye
did make a thing with such a cry?

0900, 30C

The westerly that has flowed,
cooling and caressing,
lulling us through the small hours,
has warmed already,
heated by its passage
across the already baking land.

fledgling II: kookaburra

For weeks they have circled the clearing,
pausing at each compass point
to claim their territory with a raucous laugh,
defining its borders with their mirth.

Now with a hoarse uncertain chuckle –
soft grace notes dropped into their song –
their duet has become a trio,
and their joyous laughter fills the forest.

yet more Sunday morning ha’ sonnets

The dawn chorus begins…

Magpie song flows
a clear, bright stream

elementals I: cockatoo

With a shriek
the sky splinters,
a dawn-white shard falls,
swoops,
sulphur crest rising
like a glimpse of sun.

fledgling

At my feet,
an eviscerated hen,
sans head,
intestines spilling out.

Circling above,
breaking the silence,
a fledgling wedgetail
calls to be fed.

This is why my hens are in protective custody. There is a breeding pair of wedgetail eagles nesting just over the ridge…    

Thanks to FV for the trigger to write this – turquoise eternity.