This Bright Other Thing

7/30/15

They say it is Romantic

Living on a farm—a dirty but clean profession.

     Yet every day paying attention to that fussy person—weather—

His demands for certain details to be attended to NOW—and well;

And then there is her whim to see to this, discard that, NOW.

Truly, it can become botheration.

     Sometimes I just want invisibility

Going at dusk with horses in the field

My gaze softens without intention or pretense.

My form fades slowly into the shroud of night.

     And then to awake—the farm calling me back

The rooster’s cry, his ransomed call:

“Look, the shiny thing in the grass

Or the sun’s reflection in a puddle

That bright orb in the donkey’s gaze

Or flecks of dust freed by

A hen’s persistent pecking.”

     “Dreams are what you awake from, even as

 The goat may sink into a noonday nap.”

     Things bright and present—

Just as they ever were.