Poems by Diane Elayne Dees

At Lake Martin

by Diane Elayne Dees

From Canary Spring 2021

Diane, surrounded by hawks and egrets, lives three-quarters of a mile from the banks of the Tchefuncte River, not far from where it meets the Bogue Falaya, as they flow toward Lake Pontchartrain, where brown pelicans swoop the sky.

In April at Lake Martin,
snowy egrets nest in cypress
like fragments of clouds dropped
from Louisiana sky, an afterthought
of heaven. Egret mothers by the hundreds
gather thousands of strands of nesting fabric.
They glide white over water
to neighboring woods, then back,
their straw basket of vines and twigs
drooping from elegant heads.

Tufts of Spanish moss are swamp scarves
draped on tupelo: Nyssa aquatica,
the water nymph who shrouded the river
when Evangeline made her mournful trip
down the Atchafalaya, never again
to lay eyes on Acadie.

When the evening sky turns pink,
it is hard to tell the logs from the alligators.
All is not hushed; there is a mesmerizing rhythm
in the orchestra of owls, frogs and insects
who sweep the dream path clear for nestlings.

The night is sapphire, but for the golden orbs
of owls who watch the moon and listen to the pines
murmur their secrets. They wait for morning,
and the new pink sky. Soon there will be fresh pink
in the cypress limbs. Roseate spoonbills mass
the trees just down the path from the white forest
of egrets. Pink mothers perch high,
a dream of strawberry ice,
complete with spoons, waiting
to feed the rosiest-cheeked babies.

Mist covers Lake Martin,
blurring the white and pink,
floating through miles of ancient branches,
laying a soft veil over the swamp,
hiding it from the world.

Previously published in Spillway Review.

Morning Glory

by Diane Elayne Dees

From Canary Fall 2024

After an entire summer of vining green,
in autumn, the leaves—some already
destroyed by insects—turn brown
and curl, turn black and fall off.
Then, suddenly, one cold mid-November
morning, an explosion of cornflower violet
blooms takes my breath away, and I,
the aging gardener, must trust
that I have received a gift
of shocking blue metaphor.