Christmas in Phoenix
by Judy Curtis
The day before another Christmas
After a night of drizzled rain
Dawns dull as hills push off
Peach flushed cloud quilts.
The rain barrel surface boils cold
From splattered gutter drops
And pummeled blue salvia waits
For drying sun to lift its stems again.
The neighbor’s black and white cat
Pads the pink, stuccoed wall,
Pausing alert at the call of a quail
A woodpecker glides from the ironwood,
Lands vertical on a saguaro
And pecks at a hole it has started there,
While a hummer, whirring back and forth,
Drains the chuperosa flowers.
This is not a day of note for them.
Citrus Christmas trees
Laden with orange and yellow balls
Shower liquid crystals
When I reach to pick the fruit
For later rising guests.
Peeled and sliced I’ll add them
To the warm flood of other foods
Eaten at this season of the year.Soon the children will appear,
Excitement breaking over the banks
In their eyes.
For them it is the longest day
To have to play with year-old games,
Rearrange the crèche and tree
And shake wrapped secrets one more time.
After a night of drizzled rain
Dawns dull as hills push off
Peach flushed cloud quilts.
The rain barrel surface boils cold
From splattered gutter drops
And pummeled blue salvia waits
For drying sun to lift its stems again.
The neighbor’s black and white cat
Pads the pink, stuccoed wall,
Pausing alert at the call of a quail
A woodpecker glides from the ironwood,
Lands vertical on a saguaro
And pecks at a hole it has started there,
While a hummer, whirring back and forth,
Drains the chuperosa flowers.
This is not a day of note for them.
Citrus Christmas trees
Laden with orange and yellow balls
Shower liquid crystals
When I reach to pick the fruit
For later rising guests.
Peeled and sliced I’ll add them
To the warm flood of other foods
Eaten at this season of the year.Soon the children will appear,
Excitement breaking over the banks
In their eyes.
For them it is the longest day
To have to play with year-old games,
Rearrange the crèche and tree
And shake wrapped secrets one more time.
This clean-washed day will spend itself
In easy talk, remembered times,
Accompanied by familiar tunes
Flowing through our minds
With well-known words
To comfort, affirm, assure us
That we need Christmas rain
To drench the deserts of our lives.
3 Responses
Beautiful, Judy. Thanks for posting it, Emily.
What a lovely poem for Christmas.
I love the images in this poem. Thank you.