Wordbirds, 26

This new series—“Wordbirds”—arises from a journey I am taking through my Webster’s 3rd Dictionary. What I’m doing: I look on the first page for each letter, and the first word that flies up at me (because I don’t know it, because I just think it’s interesting, etc.) becomes the subject for that day’s doggerel. I will move through letter z, then work my way back again, the second time using the last page of each letter’s section of Webster's. Let’s see what happens ...

Words that flew into my life from Webster’s 3^rd …

zaman noun [zuh-MAHN]

rain tree

They sat beneath the wide zuman

And read the lines of “Kubla Khan.”

They talked about the realm of dream,

And thought about the errie seam

That separates the worlds of day

And night. The rain drove them away.

And afterwards—how they did try

To recreate that lullaby

Of Love that they together felt,

Where they had sat, where they had knelt.

But Time forbade it certainly,

And all remained a mystery.

They found their present could not last—

It changed too swiftly to the past.