Nature’s Healing of Neuroses by William Ruleman

 


 

William Ruleman recently retired from college teaching to devote himself to writing, painting, translation, and (when possible) travel. His poems have appeared most recently in The Amethyst Review, Mused: The BellaOnline Literary Review, and NatureWriting. His Verse for the Journey: Poems on the Wandering Life, a collection of his translations of poems by the German Romantics, and his Salzkammergut Poems (both from Cedar Springs Books) focus on his experiences in the natural realm.

His website is www.williamruleman.com.

 


 

 

               

 

 

Nature’s Healing of Neuroses

 

(13 June 2018)

 

I wake perturbed by what some stranger said,

By what some phrase of mine by chance implied;

I mope round, riled by rants that I have read;

I feel the Devil ever at my side,

Enticing me with wishes I were dead

Or vague suspicions I have long since died

And now am wandering, a shade in Hell

With but a tedious tale of earth to tell.

 

But then I look out on this late spring day

With my mimosa tree in flower once more,

Its bird-plumes pink against a sky blue-gray

In our lush garden, far from traffic’s roar,

Here where robins sing and cardinals play

And blue hydrangeas bloom as ne’er before;

And, mesmerized by all that gushing green,

I know a heart and mind once more serene.

  

 

William Ruleman

 

 

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