odd night light

 odd, intense small light in the sky

in the middle of the night

at first i thought it was landing lights

on a fair-sized plane approaching

the airfield just northeast of my home

but it did not blink or move among

dense clouds and was too intense

i felt curiously chilled for a moment

and then clouds gave way a bit so

the intensity of pale yellow increased

and i recognized our moon

although little of it showed

how weird it felt had to see such color

with suspicions of something strange

in my sky

late start but coming

 haiku

chill plus rain tonight

sleet and snow in the offing

January winter

murky morning

haiku

 murky morning with

the valley fog huddling in

tints of greenish gray

fog murmurs

light fog hides the Pacific

rolling in quiet and muffling sounds

of normal day activities to distortion

until even early afternoon has a chill

a haunted feel and buckled deformation

that murmurs a garbled transformation

to a world we only thought we knew

April 8, 2024

eeriness of a sudden chill

birds fluttering, darting to nests

bats lifting from inverted sleep

giraffes shifting to shelter their young

horses meandering, sure only in line

with others, also restless and uncertain

dogs whimpering, cowering

or crawling to be near awed masters

standing, arms raised, intent upon

the midnight sky barely past noon

with blotted sun exposing only odd

ring of blue- or gold-white coronet

lasting minutes between diamond

and diamond

rare, beautiful, strange

gift for a lifetime shared with so many

experiencing as never before

their common, frail humanity

acknowledging the vastness of reality

spell giving way

more yellow in this morning’s sky

pre-dawn indigo had a tinge of green

sunrise corals washed-out, muted

by hovering mist hinting with chill

that the freakish spell of unseasonable

warmth will again give way to March

to pinch too-early rhododendrons buds

gray-blue greeting

gray-blue morning

misted deep sky obscuring stars

chill fingers outside the covers

signs of autumn not coming

            but here

pinker than yellow-black

chill, pink morning so autumnal

i walk not in fear

of yellow jackets swarming

from their ground nests

my porch and yard

are, finally, again my own

and she can get crankier

chill morning, un-summerlike

odd weather for mid-June

in a year of unexpected heat

too early in the season

as though Grandma Nature

were getting cranky in her old age

wind-whispered promise

 despite the cold

that burrows under the skin

to gnaw at the marrow

in my bones

the wind that lifts

and swirls sparkling flakes

tells me the snow will cling

to the mountains

and, in the spring, melt

as water for crops

a gift longer-term

and worth my shivering

            mjNordgren  12/26/2022  Omaha

welcome barrier

toughened bare feet so the cold

is recognized but does not, for a beat,

spread through my being when i step into light snow

i can dash to do what needs be and hurry back to shelter

without chill if i am quick

how i wish my anger knew such a buffer before erupting

oregon may 1st

may has arrived

chill, gray, deflowered, hopeful

man will learn to care