Saturday, June 14, 2025

Rustling Reeds by Diane Allerdyce

Image | David Dibert

Rustling Reeds  

Rustling reeds at the edge of the water

teem with wildlife that is invisible 

in the undergrowth—filtered with sunlight

and not all that quiet when one listens

 

to the negotiations, the barter

going on beneath the surface, quibble

and exchange economies of trade, bright

ambitions of amphibian glistenings.

 

Above the rustle, the lake’s gentle waves

may belie the complexities below,

inviting us to stop and consider

 

worlds otherwise unseen, those inner caves

beyond the surface so that we might know

soft rays of compassion growing nearer.

 

© Diane Allerdyce


Diane Allerdyce

Diane is a poet, professor, parent, partner, grandmother, musician, yogi, and caregiver for whom poetry is a balm for the soul. Her poems have appeared in TheGroundUp, Reflections: Narratives of Professional Helping, the chapbook Whatever It Is I was Giving Up, and the collection of prose and poetry House of Aching Beauty.

Her story “The Gift” appeared in the North American Review (Fall 2019: 304.4: 43-50). (It was inspired, in part, by Wallace Stegner’s “Goin’ to Town”; an interview about her process appears at https://northamericanreview.org/open-space/conversation-diane-allerdyce-discusses-her-story-gift-her-partner-rory-spearing ). Diane’s short story “Kochma” appeared in Stories that Need to be Told 2022: A TulipTree Anthology; it was also the first-place winner in the UK-based National Association of Writers and Groups (NAWG)’s 2022 Open Competition for Fiction and was republished with permission in their 2022 Anthology of Award-Winning Writing.


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