Legacy

                                                The Echo of What Remains Collected Poems of Wanda Lea Brayton

Dry dust will not claim this marrow

until I am ready to forsake the eternal greening of my heart;

restless moments of rustling leaves will not tame me,

nor will feast or famine sway me from this path.

The sea will surge,

coming ashore with its remnants

of another life to quell quiet moments.

I shall not weep any longer.

The world has depleted too much strength as it is.

Let flowers rise under another's tears,

if they must. Let them curl their blooms

beneath a mournful moon. I shall not care.

I am preoccupied with swirling

under a pale sun. I am ferocious

and wild beneath layers of solicitous laughter.

I am a nascent seed,

discovering the depths of soil as I take root.

I will not return this legacy of harvest. 

The Forest of Your Smile

The Echo of What Remains Collected Poems of Wanda Lea Brayton

They shimmer bronze, like a summer breeze.

Your hands describe curves of the moon.

Orchids rise upon your breath, stems curl as lips in laughter.

I whisper, “How green are my eyes tonight?”

You tell me leaves turn over when rain comes near and birds are silent.

Love Answers Pablo's Grief: Inspired by Neruda

The Echo of What Remains Collected Poems of Wanda Lea Brayton

Your sad eyes weep, sweet salt flowing upon my flesh 

as rain is softened by the fall; as dusk descends, 

it covers the mountains with remnants of fire.

Your melancholy takes root, lifting my boughs in its wind.

We could never lose this moment, as it is enshrined 

deeply within our hearts, my Love - how can you not know the truth 

of this gift, these everlasting memories which shall not tarnish or fade?

Our reminiscences of this day, this night, become currency we shall not spend 

frivolously, even in our diminishing years. I am never far away from you, 

never disappearing into the mist that surrounds you as you moan.

I shall gather your hands to my breast so you might feel its thrum, 

the constant rhythms of one who pulses near you, who remains within your sight 

if you will only raise your head, turn your eyes outward, draw me closer 

than your sorrow.Your blue sweater is wrapped around my shoulders 

as I pull you into a warm, liquid embrace - a river, surrendering itself to the sea. 

The shore may be hidden by the fog, but it is there, Beloved. 

We are standing on its fluent, moving currents, our feet planted 

in sodden sand, shimmering sculptures of quiet rhapsodies unveiled;

we shall not sink below the surface - our unfurled wings shall keep us afloat 

as we murmur within these slow waves of song.

A Moment With Emily

The Echo of What Remains Collected Poems of Wanda Lea Brayton


My columns on a variety of subjects

In Amherst,

there is a quiet house

enormous with history.

She watched the world expand

through her narrow window there,

perhaps never realizing how generous

she would become.

Her gifts remained largely unnoticed 

in the business and busyness of people living their lives

as best they knew how, not understanding

she held the key to secret, unseen doors

where perception might grow as large 

as the wisteria she tended with merciful hands.

First in black, then white,

she strolled softly between burgeoning branches,

sifting fruit and petals alike with pale fingers

holding her lace shawl on her shoulders bent with accumulation.

Often, she would soothe her hounds 

as darkness descended, lost in mysterious reveries

none could explain.

Under candle’s glow, she would read the classics,

and writing far beyond her breadth,

outmaster them all with a redolent stroke of her pen.

She could not have known

the ancients would shudder and thrill the starlight,

thoughtfully gazing through her portal

as time was severed from its leash

and night grew dim.

Creativity (Updated 11/26/12)

my newest poem

song of crisp leaves

song of crisp leaves

all poems

poems by Wanda Lea Brayton

My poetry site author's page

My poetry author's page

Update: four new columns posted now

one on the photographer Imogen Cunningham, one on Pulitzer Prize winner and Poet Laureate Ted Kooser, Naomi Shihab Nye and the latest column is on Jane Hirshfield.

My columns on a variety of subjects

(arch - graphic artist unknown)

Autumn's Glisten

The Echo of What Remains Collected Poems of Wanda Lea Brayton

Winter performed a mighty glissade,

keeping its balance with vulnerability and valor

hedged against the tender pall.

Hibernation became my wise reckoning.

Spring taunted me with burgeoning buds

and whispered with incessant insouciance.

I felt the greening within, 

long before its warmth settled upon the nape of my neck 

as the horizon moaned its awful ache.

This inviolable landscape shuddered swiftly

and arched into Summer’s rage of fiery breath,

stealing my splendor of song, its slow echoes lost.

I waited patiently for the onslaught, the oncoming vortex - 

soft wind loose, then tightened into smaller circles

that cautioned a confluence of chill chaos.

Autumn arrives now, its welcome hearth

resplendent with the solemn solace of flame.

The ardor of leaves as they scurry within the lane

brings humility and comfort to bones ever weary for rest.

Redolent with harvest, 

sinuous storms will follow.

I gather a gradual, cautious bouquet of silence

from branches bared with knowing what lies ahead

while September begins to compose 

its crisp and brilliant symphonies.

A More Solemn Letting Go

The Echo of What Remains Collected Poems of Wanda Lea Brayton

Veiled Woman 1910 Imogen Cunningham

Melodies unweave crisped notes above loosely wrapped, confused flesh

to help soothe and subdue them into their darkly-writhing graves - 

even the newly dead require a rite of passage, 

a more solemn letting go 

than a mere scattering of petals would imply.

They feel the weight of a clouded sky pressing down,

the force of gravity constraining their brittle bones beneath the soil

as they still remember the warmth of sunlight 

upon their now paled, gray faces.

Do not speak unkindly or step over them without pause,

for they will know the depths of your presence soon enough -

you will not be able to plead or barter your way out 

of these evolutionary circles, 

away from this binding, terrible truth.

So I am wandering looking for new deities,

sweeping dirt to and fro, seeking a softer place to kneel

than memory will offer this gasped grinding of grief,

this swift severing of halves from wholes,

this etching of echoes carving caves into heaving, heavy hearts

that know of no better place to release their barbed-wire laughter,

their cautious aspects of mourning, each stuttered step acknowledging 

such fiery, distant drums.