Silent Whisper

There are mornings, and then there are mornings. This morning started in the usual Copper Country fashion - dark with a side order of crisp, cold air. A bit of ice frosted my windshield and old Jack Frost was nipping at more than my nose. Although my attention was focused on driving and avoiding those critters foolish enough to play dash and die on the highway, I noticed a thin line of reddish warm light throwing the trees into relief along the road and pushing back the purple and indigo of early dawn. Still, I trudged up to my office, not quite registering that the day had begun, and I happened to glance out a window. There were the leafless and gaunt gray forms of oaks and maples and birches and poplars - crowded around the old building from where I gazed, and in silent profusion they waited for the sun to breach the horizon and warm their branches, windblown and chilled by the night. As the first rays of the Autumn morning's beacon touched their outstretched limbs, I swear I heard them whisper a silent good bye to the shadows of night...

Mick

Silent Whisper

Beyond my window, the arms of the trees
Attempt to scatter the moon's morning light -
The last gasp of night, that one only sees
At the break of dawn, with untarnished sight.
The crooked gray limbs reach high and away,
From scattering shadows on forest floor;
In the early breezes, they swing and sway
As if they pray for the sun's warmth, and more...
In haughty silence, they patiently wait
For the Autumn sun, to paint with its rays
Their stately gaunt branches, destined by fate
To divide the sky in a thousand ways,
As the sun crests the hills, golden and bright,
And silently whisper good bye to night.

Mick McKellar
October 2007