Monday, November 11, 2019

YOKEL ( 5 ) ~









B R I D E   O F
Y O K E L


Once rigor is established
a certain beauty is possible

PAUL VALERY





Work Day






I like

her 

sweater



it used

to be

mine







Nothing






After ten days heat

Air still, a match

Flame unnerved

In the flue of the cook stove

We came out on the 11th day

To the breezes back cool,

Yellow leaves of a dying elm

Flying apart, grasses wet

To the high boots, and on that day

Quieter and the river clearer and

More part of itself, I crossed

Water at a narrow flow to find

Where this owl calls after days

Of silence, and while hiking up

The other side there was nothing





Limp





We knew Native must be still living

There even though her husband has been

Dead now over ten years and back then

They appeared inseparable. Sure enough

We came around the bend on bicycles and

Could see Native moving in the backyard near

The house pulling on something — black plastic

Skirted the place over winter and she was just

Getting to pull it off and put away. Stovepipes

Going up high on either gable end of the house,

Big barn now shut down across the road, all the

Other sheds and of course the sweep of pastures.

Here we are at heaven on earth as we glide

On bicycles closer and Native appears around

The corner limping bad and hair torn

Dragging the plastic and not about to stop to

Talk but when I ask how she has been she

Stammers with an awful hitch to her step that

Before the limp she was an awful lot better.





Diary





Working with her in the sun

We break for lunch in the sun

Share sandwiches in the sun

Finish and lay back in the sun

Soon we are kissing in the sun




_______________
Bob Arnold
Yokel
Longhouse
2011