With the chilling inevitability
of frost creeping along the edges
of a leaf, the seasons fade
and time erodes memories.
What once seemed unforgettable
is reduced to crumbling letters
and dusty snapshots peeled from
a sodden box wrapped in webs
in a flooded basement.
Children outgrow our arms,
and we must let go.
For OctPoWriMo 2021, I decided to revisit and respond to some of my older poems. “Harvest,” written in about 1993, is below. Some of my lines were illegible, and this is what remains.
Harvest
Summer always ends with a hayride,
itchy straw on a bumpy road.
This ritual is my custody,
a day in the sun with my harvest.
This time I share the three with no one.
Two heads like the silk of early corn,
one brown with the silk of older ears,
bump against my arms and chest,
shampoo fragrance rising with the dust.
…Later from a hill we see
beyond this cornfield, another,
and the only road is the one we’re on.
Inspired by prompts from DJ Ranch and Word of the Day and shared on Artistic License.
....Bilocalalia.... 