pink star magnolias …oil painting

Pink star magnolia (9″ x 12″)

The residential streets here in Vancouver are all abloom with cherry blossoms and magnolias. To my eye the magnolias are almost strangely exotic in their extravagance …beautiful and ephemeral.

Tom’s poem almost magically catches that quality and that moment.

From tropic climes to temperate tropes
blooming bright, first off the mark,
before their leaves have burst with hopes
of summer sun and sultry dark
deep starry nights of beauty wild:
magnolias cast off their mild
and staid retiring winter manner
throwing out their blossom’s banners
to catch a bee or beetle’s fancy
drawing them into a tryst
while the sun drives off the mist
in morning glow like yellow tansy.
The stars of Earth shine in the trees
where magnolias catch spring’s breeze.

image (c) 2018 Hilary Farmer
poem (c) 2018 TJ Radcliffe