I find a meadow trail, stumps like nightstands
attempting shade in regular patterns. Vines slither
with nothing to stranglehold. The fire
has made room for dandelions’ sweet stink,
flutter curls like babies’ new hair. I’ve come
from the campground where family splits
my body, mouth lassoed with stories
not mine. I’ve come to shake off the nests
of madness then suckle late-hatched chicks.
To question spittlebugs hidden on the back-side
of new leaves, the ground stained
acid green. Here, sparrows turn over detritus
with a jump back, jump forward. Drawn
in their eyes an arc, they too
beginnings of madness. The sky decides
no reflection for dun feathers, outlining
a future filled in with reticence.
Squirrels run as if acorns
would drop. In truth, I braced myself ahead,
but the skeletons of a dense wood require
backbone to imagine the squeaky
waka-waka song of an acorn woodpecker,
red cap visibility something definite
when screams bind. In the distance,
binocular vision is necessary to isolate,
here and there, small mounds
where gophers insist on receiving the earth.
—
Laurel Benjamin is a San Francisco Bay Area poet, active with the Women’s Poetry Salon. She curates Ekphrastic Writers and is a reader for Common Ground Review. Current publications: Pirene’s Fountain, Lily Poetry Review, Cider Press Review, Taos Journal of Poetry. She is a Cider Press Review Book Award finalist, Pushcart Prize nominee, and received an Honorable Mention for the Ruben Rose Memorial Poetry Competition. Find her at: https://www.laurelbenjamin.com
