To-night, dear,
Let’s forget all that, that and the war,
And enisle ourselves a little beyond time,
You with this Irish whiskey, I with red wine.
– Robinson Jeffers, (“For Una”)
We talk cattle, calves turned cows by years
gone quickly now. Native girls and daughters
bred to handsome men who got around,
got by on grass – boring the dogs and cats
to sleep at our feet, come the gloaming.
First-calf heifers graze closer – black babies
butt heads, buck and run into the open pen –
to eavesdrop upon our mantra amid a chorus
of tree frogs, near and far, layers of jubilant
croaking unfolding beyond our ears. We
recognize the red cow’s call to her blind calf
who’s wandered off in circles after grass –
a distant, impatient blast he answers and turns
towards, walking straight across the pasture
into black milk. Out on the road, neighbors
coming home, old folks poking looks
at wood ducks in the creek as the planet
quakes with the day’s more pressing matters.
drycrikjournal 