Life Rising
by Colleen M. Farrelly
Half-dead plants grasping
through a broken,
wood-checked screen
to the basic-build
church chair strangled
by fingers
and leaves,
fallen cold and dead,
to the dirt caked
over knotted roots
of the lumbering tree like
the clackity-clack of the track
and catching bridge joints
beyond the sleepless hollow.
Dawn drowns
the split snow.
A lone lily
pokes through
the thistles.
Wildlife Haiku
iguana lazing
in summer sun—a shadow
and a sudden splash
a green flock squawking
soaring chasing and settling
swiftly on phone wires
speckled lizard
scurrying across afternoon
parking lot rivers
ibis creeping low
in spring’s oasis
before jaws snap shut
Art Walk Past
Smaller
than I had expected,
no pool
reflecting rolling moonlight
as we sit atop the roof
after the resounding
bass readied itself for bed,
the last revelers
drinking in Warhol-esque sketches
and scrambled Mondrian cityscapes—
or the urban Kandi Kids’
handprints
lining the siding—
like a childhood chalkscape’s
older cousin—
and slinking into the shadows.
Darkness veils
the pinks and purples,
creeping
towards the fence,
a fog furled
over a lone two figures
staring at the sliver of silver
beyond the horizon.
Grandma’s Porch
Bare feet
pitter-patter
across grandma’s front porch
with an urgency unique to
childhood,
abandoning toys and cool-aid
to catch this new play-thing—
green, croaking—on
her porch.
BIO
Colleen M. Farrelly is a freelance writer from Miami, FL, whose works have recently appeared in Spank the Carp, The Recusant, and KDNuggets, among others. She is the author of the chapbook, Places and Faces. When she isn’t writing, she is a mathematics researcher and avid swimmer.
