Sunrise

Sunrise
Sunrise on Sunset Beach

Thursday, October 4, 2018

A Close Encounter with an Old Field

It’s just an old field. 

I have been back more than once, 

perplexed 


at how ordinary 

in the light of late afternoon, 

or morning, or the glare of noon. 


It’s gone. 

Whatever was is not now. 

It seems a shame, the un-tame rush 


replaced by shrug 

and stolen glance 

at time, 


the slow ride home for reheated leftovers 

to sustain my aging. 

It was fall


when I went wandering

blazed paths through pungent hush

of hickory, beech, and white oak stands 


to forest edge at right-of-way, 

cut straight across the curve of hills 

where I stood blinking back the light.


By the sun-splashed shores

of an old field grown wild

breaking over asphalt slabs


which once went somewhere

beyond the post hole fence

that vainly holds back green


swells of sumac and thistle

tangled in turbulence

sparkling in the silent roar


     Of a thin place opening

          onto an emerald sea


in the presence of which

I would remove my shoes

wash my soul in sunlight


and float the timeless warmth

to a new heaven

and a new earth.


But that was all, and over soon, 

just slant of light and insect drone, 

no still small voice that could be heard 


above the buzz and background trill, 

so was it somehow up to me 

to say aloud what hangs in air?


     All flesh is grass, its beauty as

          the flower of the field


that dies with fall – been said by better

than one who wanted just right then 

no more than now and this sweet earth 


of distant laughter, lovers strolling, 

stoic mother gently holding sleek 

cell phone and squirming child. 


Right there beneath the freshening breeze

a shadow passed 

inside of me:


     You hear your heart

          not that of mine


And in the voiceless hush I heard 

a hymn of weeds 

set in my mind:


     Take the sun and set your roots, 

          soften earth and heal the scars 


For several seasons I’ve returned, 

but never caught the song again, never 

heard what speaks from the silence inside.




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