Ronald Terry- A Poem

 

Bones of the Gods

Deep blows death,

snow that buries the church.

Far away a young girl sings sweetly;

her song summons you to a cold bed,

but she is nowhere to be seen.

Her body long ago rose into mist,

and only her song stirs the dust.

The shadows dance at the edge of the fire.

Its warmth is perhaps her breath

lightly against your cheek.

Now is the time to sleep,

to let the bones

rise from waves

and settle in the cross

formed by the branches of a tree.

When you awake,

you will be alone among the hills,

and your children shall kneel

on their own wilted graves

before the image of a fading sun.

Brief bio:

Raised in Jackson and Meridian, Mississippi, Ronald Terry earned an M.A. in English from the University of Southern Mississippi, where he wrote his Master's Thesis on the poetry of Ted Hughes ("Ted Hughes and the Power of Darkness"). Mr. Terry started his career as a Secondary School and Community College teacher but for the past 28 years has worked as a Technical Writer in Dallas/Fort Worth, Texas. His publications are not extensive, just poetry in small magazines such as Night Cry, Space and Time, Amanita Brandy, and a few others. In recent years, just for fun, he has experimented with writing free verse and prose poems in the Old English (Anglo-Saxon) language, totally ignoring traditional Old English metrical forms. An ardent Celtic music fan, he can be seen every year haunting all the Irish/Scottish heritage festivals in North Texas.