annual honeysuckle poem, ahead of schedule

you! I wrote your poem already
last year and the year before that...
but this afternoon
blue blasts through the cloud cover;
I round the corner, bent on an ordinary errand,
shoot through a fleet scent
like a warm spot in the sea
and stop, stock-still:
what was that streak of happy?

stepping back the smell swells;
goodmorninghellohappynewyear it's you!

slipping the stamens (forgiving the
gajillion green raindrops of the week)
lights fireworks inside my face
and each white or yellow trumpet blossom
gets under my tongue and under my feet
giving me nectar-fueled jetboots
that blast me above cloud cover,
let me hover over May, over today,
and sight the fence of a far-off June
where I learned to suck honeysuckle

Is it crazy to be walloped so soundly every year by the same short-lived miracle? I stood yesterday enjoying my son's enjoyment, remembering my daughter's (see previously published ode below), but selfishly relishing my own surrender to The Sensory Power of the Honeysuckle Experience. (Ooh, and when I play in a band, after we finally negotiate an 8th day of the week, it will be called The Honeysuckle Experience.)


Honeysuckle Hunting

It could be anywhere.
We stand stock still and sniff
the green breathing of daisy, vine and leaf.

Ears pricked and noses high,
we listen for the drowsy hum
of yellow golden honey.

There, on the fence!
We'll steal it from the bees,
pluck a tiny trumpet blossom,

pinch the end with finger and thumb,
like biting the vanilla-dripping tip
of an ice cream cone.

Slowly, slowly, draw it out--
pull the stamen through, tongue poised
to catch one crystal drop of sweetness.

~Heidi Mordhorst
from Squeeze: Poems from a Juicy Universe, 2005

Join Julie at The Drift Record for this week's Poetry Friday roundup!