The Sun Tight as a Fist All Summer, Then

The cornfield outside my bedroom window changed yesterday.
Stalk tops stretch higher than before
then bow as if from the weight of their fresh, fast growth.
(Corn never sleeps, you know).

Even as the stalks tower, diffusive dawn light penetrates
each stalk's leaves. Still dream-filled and barely awake
I look, then avert my eyes.
(Corn can be modest, did you know?)

Yet, yellow streaks are gaining ground on some stalks.
They seem to hover at the very edge of the house
leaning in, like an assembly of elders at a cradle
crooning an ancient lullaby.
Their hands are wrinkled, age-spotted skin
papery thin like crisp tissue paper
transparent, betraying their ethics of care.

So I sleep the sleep of a babe
enchanted--who wouldn't?

Meanwhile, while I sleep
soundlessly in the dark
another ancient ritual begins.
The deer rut through the corn fields.
If I were to awaken I might imagine
hearing a swishing sound
but no, it is irreverently quiet.
Spent at dawn, statuesque the deer hesitate
in a nearby open field, before vanishing.

If the sun set like a fist
over the corn field
throughout most of summer
last evening as well,
now it rises
fingers of light splayed across the land.

The land and its particulars: Corn. Deer. Me.
An odd trinity of sorts.

Seeming to beckon, the fist now opening,
fingers of light arch back
toward the body of the world
an invitation to that first dazzling space.