After word of my father’s illness, in rural Wyoming



Now to step outside
from the day’s disquiet
wanting simply to witness visible breath
and whatever moves, whatever comes--
that balm of being remote.

But at once, again comes need—
for stacking clouds to have buoyed the day
more than staid cold blue, for the scent
of father’s timothy fields, blossoming… 
of his plowed soil, steaming in morning chill
with the promising scent of things growing.

Or perhaps a far ridge of horses, silhouettes
against a violet sky--their running much lighter
than can be imagined for bodies of such weight;
such manes of flight… a beauty

that won’t abandon, the kind to return to
if you remain able to choose,
whether farm buildings slump or collapse,
whether deer return to the small,
shrinking pond or are not seen again… 
whether you stay rooted here
or have to move elsewhere.

A bevy of small birds alights
under hawthorn, searching out berries.
In the faint stir of remaining leaves
you try to nurture what should come next…. 

When tops of trees are lit at sundown,
the coming night pools over strewn fallings,
true colors manifold then laid down flatly
like a final word on hope.

In that moment cold breezes rise… and the birds,
as if one body. At horizon comes the faint gloss
of the next moon phase before it rises,
whatever the waning crescent; what I see
are my father’s wheatfields… 
cupping hidden earthshine