Summer’s Shades
After spring’s pastels come summer orange.
Like a glaze, lilac hardens to purple,
carnation pink deepens to a rose tinge;
and powder blue turns cobalt, deep and full.
While on branch and twig, birds sing, perch, or cringe –
sweet songs praising, perhaps, shades bright or dull.
In summer the birds soar o’er prairies singed
by a sun that dyes grass like golden wool.
Like through a syringe, bright colors Time pulls,
while the moon, white skull, illumes the night strange.
