Tilting Away & Towards The Sun

I look outside my window
Snow falls down
Like the down feathers of the fleeing geese gone for winter

Cold bites through me as I turn away from the sun
The dance remains the same from millenia to millenia
As we dance through the cosmos revolving one around the other
I circle you yet it is coldest when I am closer.

I wake to the birds chirping
Babies of the wild needing to be fed
Buds peek out from the ground, sleepy eyed

I lean more towards you as I pass you by
Your heat warms my frozen heart
Though I yearn for the heat I can not not now
It is not time. Seduce me into the heat as we dance in circles

I can not bear this heat
Sweat drips from my brow
The only wetness dripping upon barren ground as the sun burns in anger above

Leaning towards you the heat burns away all thought
I face you completely, no longer do I turn away even in part
I reach for you though I am in fact the farthest away
Burn me, my center, heat me up with your gaze

I can feel the crispness in the air
The colors of the leaves
Like a child’s crayons strewn across branches coloring cool moonlit nights

I am turning away my love
I know. The heat of our being together is too much
I know. The chill sets in your tone
I reap the harvest of what has come before. As we’ve done before

I see the snow
The earth tilts away from the sun in winter
I hear the birds
In spring the Northern Hemisphere tilts more towards the sun
Sweat drips from my brown
Until the Summer Solstice when the axis is as close to the sun as it can get
The colors of the leaves change
And then the rotation of the earth causes the axis to tilt away
Than it happens all again

This is from a prompt from dVerse : “today we write about cycles of transformation. Anything will do, but your poem needs to have a beginning, middle, and end. … I’d like you to try incorporating at least a few lines of personification, in first person. Imagine you are whatever you’re writing about. Give it a voice and take us through its existence from conception to …”

I went with the seasons. A bit of a fudge on cycle of transformation but it is there. The weather does transform from winter to spring to summer to fall. I also did the personification of the earth as a lover to the sun in the alternating stanzas. I hope you enjoy.


Published by authorstew

C. Stuart Lewis creates poems with feeling, intelligence and sex appeal. His short stories and books focus on characters that feel real in real world situations. Originally from the United States he now resides in Ontario, Canada. Check out his webpage at TheAuthorStew.ca

11 thoughts on “Tilting Away & Towards The Sun

  1. This took me back to my earth science tutoring days, and planetary science too. And also to the cycles of rejection and attraction implicit in some relationships – you alternated thesse very skilfully and effectively, Stew.

    Like

  2. This cycle is so familiar, Stew, yet you made it brand new. These lines stand out for me:

    ‘I can feel the crispness in the air
    The colors of the leaves
    Like a child’s crayons strewn across branches coloring cool moonlit nights’.

    Liked by 2 people

    1. Thank you! That’s a great compliment. Always nice to get to see the familiar in new ways. Funny enough those lines were the ones that seemed the most awkward when writing; trying to keep the last lines of the alternate stanzas the same ‘like a …’ quality.

      Liked by 1 person

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