The moon dictates the palette.
Bare branches write down the theme.
Time thins to a single breath.
Only a red note,
a small refusal,
betrays the world’s lingering warmth.
–Jujube
Bird
Leave a reply
Category Archives: Poetry Illustrated
Afternoon Tea
the ceramic holds its breath
let the flowers define the air
sweetened conversations
linger in the shadows
asking the empty chairs
who decides
what moment lasts
–Jujube
Early Winter Woods
The early winter woods are a letter
Torn open by the wind
Script scatters on the ground
Shifting, recombining
Sunlight hesitates among the branches
Weaving threads of gray
Trying to string together a plot
Only to read
Two silent ellipses
— Jujube
Without Ceremony
You move through a whisper,
loosening from its own name.
Birds rise. Grass bends.
The sun hesitates.
We are not what we once were—
the field knows this.
It gives you back to the wind,
without ceremony.
— Jujube
The Russian Song
In distant lands, on hill and plain,
thus do I dream, when nights are long, —
and memory gives back again
the whisper of that long-lost song.
— V. Nabokov
Still Life
You can almost hear it —
autumn’s last gasp
a pomegranate split open
grapes hang low drowsy
a pear half-turned to gold
held by the brush
silently resists decay
— jujube
Rainy Day
The window holds the breath of rain.
I sink into the blueness of sleep.
Dream and daylight braid,
as the shadows of the leaves
sway.
Nocturnal Travels
I have no need, for my nocturnal travels,
of ships, I have no need of trains.
The moon’s above the checkerboard-like garden.
The window’s open. I am set.
— V. Nabokov
Night Is Young
Wine hums, lanterns flicker.
Moon sneers, time falls into dust.
Who stitches sorrow in the dimming light,
While night is still young.
Hotel Room
Not quite a bed, not quite a bench.
Wallpaper: a grim yellow.
A pair of chairs. A squinty looking-glass.
We enter — my shadow and I.
— V. Nabokov
Unusual Colors - Digital and AI art 