The mother and the father and the blossom-cheeked son
Are sitting down to supper now, posing silver forks
Like diving hawks above the gravied bread.
They have drawn the window shades
As the sky outside will make the table gray
And the bread crust old. A dusty lightbulb is cracked,
Shooting the wall through with little blue light.
Beyond, the young woman half-sits, half-splays
In the brown grass, which continues for a thousand miles
In every direction until a train station rises from the flat earth
On one side. Here there is no recourse to a moving breath,
But for the flick of a yellower blade when the wind passes over.
Light falls on the young woman’s arm, and though the paleness stays,
The ground becomes closer. In the winter soon enough white will
Fall on the plain, devouring. For the time being, the deadness of grain
Will occupy the place fully. Not even a sparrow flies overhead –
Has he lost the extra bone in his tongue, sorrowing?
If there will be a bird, he will roost on the tip of the wire fence,
And his sleep will be long.
The woman’s hair once was black and is turning the color of wheat.
She will let the farm grow wild around her, and within her, in time.
It is not enough to wear a modest dress, for pink is also
The color of earth, and a ribbon around the waist will be undone
By the wind. In the distant house smoke rises from the chimney,
A desperate breath as lifeless as the air. Shoes rest, sideward,
Yielding to the ground. They were bought a bargain, they were not
The walking kind. Almost regretfully, the smoke drifts to the west.
The arm of the woman is crooked, the limb of an injured bird.
After supper there is the tinkle of plates being rinsed in the sink.
The father sits in an armchair, his hair tidily trimmed,
Shiny black fibers combed behind the ears, and thick. In the morning
He will wake early to clip the grass in a small oval outside, and he will
Be wearing his heaviest boots. By the fire the son warms his hands
As he entertains thoughts of digesting food. The clock in the corner
Is wailing. In the darkened wheat, the woman waits
Unblinking, until the grass grows high in her eyes.