From this distance
the heavy-headed seeded sunflowers
are a daze,
star clusters in a sky of green
a thick constellated galaxy.
These sunflowers move together
to maximize light.
What seems random
motion is quantifiable,
settles as a zigzag
pattern,
spiraling shape,
so that each plant
has enough
to grow an understanding
of what surrounds.
Think, too, of the navigation,
the circumnutation of roots
as they maneuver
around hard debris,
the rocks in the soil.
—
Terri McCord’s latest published collection is The Beauts, although she is circulating a new manuscript as well. A Best of the Net and Pushcart nominee, her poems have been included in numerous journals and anthologies including the forthcoming Coast Lines anthology, Dulcet, Boats Against the Current, Slippery Elm, and New Square Review. She earned a literary fellowship (2001-2002) from the South Carolina Arts Commission, and she earned an MFA from Queens University in Charlotte. A visual artist as well, McCord loves to engage with language and the natural world.
