<![CDATA[Light and Shadow - The Rains Come]]>

<![CDATA[Light and Shadow - The Rains Come]]>Thu, 06 Aug 2026 08:48:59 -0700Weebly<![CDATA[An Experiment with Colors]]>Sun, 21 Jun 2026 11:30:47 GMThttps://www.rayzimmermanauthor.com/the-rains-come/an-experiment-with-colorsI posted these poems on Substack on June 19 and 20.

Yellow

Are you the golden sunbeam, or the earth it warms?

Are you the seed, swollen with water, or the sprout, knifing through the soil?

Are you the woody stem reaching skyward or the leaves soaking up sunlight?

Are you the golden disk of flowers or the bee drinking nectar and spreading pollen?

Are you the tightly packed head of seeds or the goldfinch that snatches a seed and flies away?

In the goldfinch, all the others are contained. Without them, no goldfinch.

Red

If you were red, would you be a Cardinal Flower blooming in a wetland where Green Frogs sing at the edge of a vernal pool?

Would you be the jaunty red crest of a Pileated Woodpecker with a chortling laugh, drilling for carpenter ants in the depths of an old oak?

Would you be the glowing embers beneath a grill, ready to cook a salmon steak or a vegetable kabob?

If I were red. I would be the feathers on the head of a Red-headed Woodpecker drumming on a limb where Bullfrogs sing of summer nuptials.

Green

My poem Green appears in the anthology Sinew from April Gloaming Publishing. As work for hire, it is not available for publication here.

Blue or The Big Crunch
This poem appeared in my book It's Just a Phase, available from Walnut Street Publishing, A Punk Publishing Collective based in Chattanooga, Tennessee.

Accelerate toward the speed of Light.
Giggle as incoming waves shift blue.
Avoid quantum singularities where
even electromagnetic rays bend.

Giggle as incoming waves shift blue.
Vision brackets a man in a blue coat.
Even electromagnetic rays bend.
He flies a blue kite, drops blue crumbs.

Vision brackets a man in a blue coat.
Growing heat invigorates storms.
He flies a blue kite, drops blue crumbs on seas
where blueish men fish.

Growing heat invigorates storms.
You approach a blue planet on seas
where blueish men fish
for blue salmon served with squid.

You approach a blue planet and Avoid
quantum singularities
where blue salmon is served with squid.
Accelerate toward the speed of light.

For the Birds
According to naturalist Aldo Leopold, the Indigo Bunting can “outblue” any Bluebird.

The Color of Fear
The fear that awakens me at 4:00 AM is a violet haze as clouds turn dark against the nightmare sky.

]]><![CDATA[The Bears of Springtime]]>Mon, 08 Jun 2026 01:24:58 GMThttps://www.rayzimmermanauthor.com/the-rains-come/the-bears-of-springtimeThis post previously appeared at Https://rayzimmerman.substack.com.

Greetings Earthlings

Bears are on the move because of a population boom. Older males chase young bears, especially young male bears, out of their territories.

A local man’s dog pulled on her leash to get into the woods. A bear of yearling size ran up the trail.

A jogger nearly came face-to-face with a larger bear, still not full-grown.

A disk jockey on a local radio station felt obliged to repeat bear reports from three neighborhoods.

Thanks to multiple reports, those place names are common knowledge. Unfortunately, bears in urban areas either move on quickly or meet a sad fate.

Remember the old saying, “a fed bear is a dead bear.”

I don’t usually repeat the place names of bear sightings, wishing to protect their gall bladders and paws. Poaching is still a big deal in Amerika.

I wish our bears all the luck they will need as they descend into civilization.

Those who came in past years have not fared well. One charged through a soccer game at Miller Park and was later shot by authorities. The bear’s identifying tag telegraphed the phrase, “Repeat visitor.”

Like her namesake companions, the celestial bear is nearly invisible here in winter, near the horizon. Some folklore says she is asleep in her den.

Do bears in their dens dream? I never dream of bears, but I have wandered, would they tell me their secrets then? Some folklore tells of the bear mother, a woman whose half-bear children became great hunters and teachers.

For more information on bear mythology, consult The Sacred Paw: Bears in Nature, Myth and Folklore by Shepherd and Sanders, or They Dance in the Sky by Monroe and Williamson.

On June 5, two fledgling birds played tag among the understory trees. Their raspy calls identified them as wrens. Carolina wrens, they are called, though they range much more widely than the boundaries of those two states.

Soon, the scorpion will rise in the Southern sky. Orion has vanished except for those few hours when he still shines brightly in the west. Folklore and mythology tell us they cannot be in the sky at the same time because of an ancient conflict.

Joseph Campbell would likely say that folklore and myth are the same. For more of that, see his book or video, The Power of Myth.

Solstice approaches, and baby birds will be grown.

]]><![CDATA[Reading Mary Oliver]]>Mon, 01 Jun 2026 10:04:31 GMThttps://www.rayzimmermanauthor.com/the-rains-come/reading-mary-oliverI am rereading Mary Oliver’s lovely book of essays, Upstream. Her childhood trauma became poetry through conversations with trees, wildflowers, and all other living things. She talks about the process and does not dwell on the trauma. If an artistic endeavor has saved your life, you might enjoy her book.]]><![CDATA[Greetings Earthlings]]>Fri, 29 May 2026 13:01:53 GMThttps://www.rayzimmermanauthor.com/the-rains-come/greetings-earthlingsI have heard that “Greetings, Earthlings,” is the most appropriate salutation for a fellow human, because we all call this planet home. Space exploration notwithstanding, the vast majority of us will never leave, and, so I have also heard, planetary resettlement will be limited to a privileged few.

One could hope that this means those privileged people who control our economy and all three branches of government will be among those who settle elsewhere. The thought gives me comfort, despite their specious claims that the rest of us would have nothing without them.

That is a far stretch from today’s topic, the literary naturalist. I once authored a column on this topic for The Hellbender Press in Knoxville. “Nature’s Bookshelf” saw its demise when The Hellbender Press ceased publication of the print edition in 2008. A few years ago, it was reborn as a digital publication.

I have authored a few articles for the new version of The Hellbender Press, including some reviews, and have published numerous reviews on Goodreads and here on Substack. Most of my reviews are of nature books, so book reviewing is part of my naturalist persona. Today, I have comments on a few recent reads.

The Glorians
The Glorians: Visitations from the Holy Ordinary
Terry Tempest Williams
Grove Atlantic
https://groveatlantic.com/book/the-gl...
Terry Tempest Williams is well known among literary naturalists, particularly for her titles, Refuge: An Unnatural History of Family and Place, When Women Were Birds, Ersoion, and The Open Space of Democracy. Her books are stories of human struggles and encounters with the divine, particularly through relationships with the natural world.

This most recent nonfiction collection begins in 2020 with the onset of COVID-19 and her hurried departure from Cambridge, Massachusetts, where she serves as Writer-in-Residence at the Harvard Divinity School. Harvard had moved classes online mid-semester and sent everyone home.

The stories continue, from her home in Utah to her return to Cambridge, and with further travels between the two. She addresses the difficulties of living in two places over a period of years.

In a dream, Williams is challenged to fulfill a promise to write “The Epic Documentation of the Glorians,” but what is a Glorian? In the introduction, Williams gives one answer.

A Glorian is an encounter.
A Glorian is a meeting with elan vital.
A glorian is a moment of grace.
The Glorians she encounters are both humans and visitors from the more-than-human world. One is a bear cub fleeing a fire. A coyote makes an appearance, and Williams makes an anigmatic reference to the Coyote Clan. This reference will be familiar to readers of her past books. Buffalo (American Bison) play a significant role.

The “Divinity Oak,” a venerable and beloved dweller on the Harvard Campus, is central to the story. The oak was already there when Ralph Waldo Emerson visited the campus. It must be cut for a new project to proceed, and this proposal results in protests, letters, and pronouncements.

The humans she encounters include the nature writer Barry Lopez, a lifelong friend, and Bell Hooks, whom she meets only through a brief message. Those encounters have a sense of homage, particularly in her description of Georgia O'Keeffe's series of paintings of the Sacred Datura.

I have read this book, and I reread sections from time to time. Despite the turmoil addressed, I find great comfort in this book.

How Flowers Made Our World: The Story of Nature's Revolutionaries
Penguin Viking
David George Haskell
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/bo...
I have read this book and return to it from time to time. I reviewed it for The Hellbender Press. https://hellbenderpress.org/news/new-...

A previous article in The Hellbender Press was intended to be a review of Haskell’s book, Sounds, Wild and Broken. It became a roundup of all of his books published up to that date, which was appropriate. I began reading Haskell’s works with his first book, The Forest Unseen, and continued the literary journey with The Songs of Trees. I thoroughly enjoyed Thirteen Ways to Smell a Tree, which was published in the UK but is also available here in the US. Each of David Haskell’s books is a delight.

The Ecopoetry Anthology
https://tupress.org/9781595349293/the...
Attached to the Living World: A New Ecopoetry Anthology
https://tupress.org/9781595343086/att...
Trinity University Press
Ann Fisher-Wirth and Laura-Gray Street
I have read poems from both of these lovely volumes and continue to read them. I hope to say more about them in a future article.

Craft and Current
Craft and Current: A Manual for Magical Writing
Janisse Ray
Privately Published
https://janisseray.com/product/craft-...
This book is essential for anyone who writes about nature. It is available from the author.]]><![CDATA[Warming Up]]>Fri, 29 May 2026 12:28:33 GMThttps://www.rayzimmermanauthor.com/the-rains-come/warming-upWarming Up

The trees have stood for years, and chemical messages travel from tree to tree. Each tells the others when bugs attack, so they will make the repellents they have concocted over the years of chemical history.

Can they tell the others of fires? It would likely be too late. Some species survive with corky bark, while others burn, making room for more trees.

Today, the chainsaws are warming up. The fire in their engines will spin a blade to chew away bark and heartwood. At the sawmill, they will become boards.

Previously published on Substack.

https://rayzimmerman.substack.com/p/prose-poems]]><![CDATA[Momentary]]>Sun, 26 Apr 2026 07:56:42 GMThttps://www.rayzimmermanauthor.com/the-rains-come/momentary

Momentary

The objects of the moment accumulate.
I bought a magazine that looked interesting
until I got it home. I bought a book,
and it sits on my desk half-read.
I refuse to throw out the fountain pen
that never worked.

Some museums collect such objects.
Their shelves hold pink knitted hats,
dropped during a MeToo march:
the memories left at war memorials
and effluvia bought at yard sales.

They sit on shelves like poets who
have had their fifteen minutes of fame.
Our performances are forgotten,
and our books are half-read.

The moment turns, and the instant fades.
Today, the sun is warm, and plants
send forth fruits and flowers.
Pollen and nectar assure good seeds,
their message to the future.

]]><![CDATA[A Special Place]]>Sat, 21 Mar 2026 00:56:19 GMThttps://www.rayzimmermanauthor.com/the-rains-come/a-special-placeA Special Place

There is a special place in the inferno
for those who design online forms.

The single mother whose public terminal shut down,
just as she finished her employment application,
will dance on your fingers as you dangle from a cliff,
from which you never fall.

If you designed a phone system
to intentionally prevent the caller
from reaching a live operator,
you will forever push buttons
that lead nowhere.

If you have lost
your travel visa for heaven,
please press three.

If you would like credit
for time spent in purgatory,
please press four.

Your call is very important to us.
Please be patient.
All demons are busily assisting
Other Inferno Bound customers.]]><![CDATA[Prose Poems]]>Thu, 26 Feb 2026 21:44:11 GMThttps://www.rayzimmermanauthor.com/the-rains-come/prose-poemsProse Poems
I
wrote these poems at a meeting of the Tennessee Poetry Society, which included a prose poetry workshop with Anne Fisher-Wirth. I first encountered her poetry in the anthology Elemental South. Fisher-Wirth is the Poet Laureate of Mississippi, and co-editor of Attached to the Living World: A New Ecopoetry Anthology

The event was a tremendous opportunity to create some new poems. Fisher-Wirth ended her presentation with the prompt “In That Kitchen.” My response and two other prose poems follow.

In That Kitchen
I washed the dishes in a sink near the stove where an elderly immigrant prepared the food. Sometimes the owner worked the grill and fed me hamburgers he had overcooked. “Why throw them out?” he’d say.

One day, they were swamped. A waitress asked me if I could make the coffee. I looked dubiously at the machine with multiple glass pots and warmers, and she laughed when I said I had never used that kind of coffee maker before. She said, “Just push that black button.”

So I pushed the button, and hot water poured from four spouts. She hadn’t mentioned the tray that slid under the spouts, the paper filter that went into the tray, or the pre-measured bag of coffee that went into the filter.

I contemplated the clean spot on the floor left behind by the mop and thought of how much easier the percolator on the stove back home must be. I never learned how to make restaurant coffee.

Two Above the Swamp at Curtain Pole Road

You circle and call above the shoreline with wings so light I could think the sun shines through. Each year I see you in pairs, here or at some other sanctuary, where you court by locking talons and fall toward the earth. Soon, eggs will need warmth, and nestlings will need to be fed.

Red-shouldered Hawks, you are Death to mice and voles. Your bodies are fires to consume flesh, and you will feed young fires. They will fly off before they learn to hunt. They will pick off rabbits and mice injured by cars and scavenging roadkill. Sometimes they become roadkill.

Those who survive will turn circles above the swamps and marshes next spring. They will find a partner and a nest tree for another turn of the cycle. Death to mice and voles, you are life to my soul.

Warming Up

The trees have stood for years, and chemical messages travel from tree to tree. Each tells the others when bugs attack, so they will make the repellents they concocted over the years of chemical history.

Can they tell the others of fires? It would likely be too late. Some species survive with corky bark, while others burn and make room for others.

Today, chainsaws are warming up. The fire in their engines will spin a blade to chew away bark and heartwood. At the sawmill, they will become boards.

]]><![CDATA[A Kettle of Vultures]]>Thu, 26 Feb 2026 21:37:41 GMThttps://www.rayzimmermanauthor.com/the-rains-come/a-kettle-of-vulturesA kettle of vultures makes a gruesome stew
They gather where hunters abandon a deer
Sit still for too long, and they might feed on you.
They eat things dead for days with nary a fear.

They gather where hunters abandon a deer.
They circle the skies until they see food.
They eat things dead for days with nary a fear.
Dead, not alive, is what they find good.

They circle the skies until they see food.
Sit still for too long, and they might feed on you.
Dead, not alive, is what they find good.
A kettle of vultures makes a gruesome stew.

]]><![CDATA[Magic]]>Thu, 26 Feb 2026 21:31:42 GMThttps://www.rayzimmermanauthor.com/the-rains-come/magicCrochety old man that I am
I experience magic when
Aquatic therapy straightens my spine
Cranes call from skies above
A throng of humans gathers to hear them call
I turn off the latest garbage.com
I am relieved after a doctor's appointment
A peppermint candy melts on my tongue
Carrots grow in my flower pots
I find a thread to gather disparate thoughts
Into a unified whole

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