We will always be suspect
no matter how much hay
we intend to feed, pickup
dripping loose alfalfa once
the strings are cut, always one
nervous on the periphery,
sensing something
from another plane
when our eyes meet.
Was it a forgotten stray
thought she found out
grazing, some unfinished
poem abandoned,
misunderstood, misheard
in the rhyming?
Or did I get close
to speaking her language—
closer than she to ever taste
the first fluffy bites
of joy and satisfaction?
So much like people
who wear their fears
like yellow slickers
always ready for a storm.
drycrikjournal 