Poetry

Four Light Poems


Falling rain, poppies exclaim
Sunny plains, scarlet lain

Chippery brreep, cloudy sheep
Shifting reeds, sweet kerpeep

Warbling fellow, flitting yellow
Old willows, gently billow

Sleepy night, slow alight
Stars abright, sleep tight!




Billowing sail, o'er the sea
Pull hard, strong to lee
Drive the spray o'er the bow
Toward shore I would thee trow

Storms behind, waves o'er top
Howling wind, the mast is lost!
Towards the reef, seething locks
Cracks the keel upon the rocks

Timbers wrench and pull apart
I grasp the shorn, torn ramparts
Damp my bones, chill my thoughts
On shore or below I dare know not




Corporeal snoreal in the tree
Sing a sweet house-marten song for me
Not too shrill, not too low
Eany, meany tiny crow
I would thee know
There are eggs for thee
Nice and fresh
Beneath the lovely alabest
Of fluting, tooting philosophy!




Oh gopher with your funny nose
Don't prick yourself upon the rose
The scent is from the flower sweet
Not upon the stem or leaf

Oh toad with your funny skin
Why at night do you make such a din?
During the day I think it matters not
If you sing and sing and sing your heart out

Oh turtle with your lowly gait
I think your ways wise and great
But is it necessary to go so slow?
Yet I fathom not the things you know


Juhan Puhm, June 28 1999