City Girl
Red wasps have taken over, swarming out
from nests tucked beneath the awnings
of the porch. He tells me not to worry,
that we can learn to coexist, that only fear
of each other brings us harm. Yesterday
I took the boat out, felt the current steal
strength from my hands, watched the yellow oar
sink into mud. Instead of rowing, I gave in
to the drift towards shore. Morning comes,
he takes his gun, heads out to conquer,
while I trace gravel roads past
the pasture fence, rough beams of wood
tied tight with twine and rusted nails. Every day
I climb this path of hills, as if rising
to some conclusion, some vital thing,
while his shots slam out like proclamations
against silence. This morning, a wasp flew out
from a corner of the kitchen, hovered over me
like doubt, like thoughts gone awry,
like some vital thing. I left my coffee,
half-sweetened, on the breakfast table as I ran.
mareymercy. 
This is beautiful, God I wish i could write like this, capturing those little idiosyncratic things that affect us so strongly but disappear as soon as they come. The boat ride, not why or where, only the end where exhaustion finds you allowing the waves to carry you in. A thought generally lost the moment the boat is tied, but you carried it here and let the reader experience that incredibly important part of the experience with you. That is so beautiful. And the alarm of hearing distant shots in the wood, who hasn’t felt as though they “slam out as proclamations against silence?” The imagery is so wonderfully verbal and real and I have experienced these same things dozens of times. (But bumble-bees are the ones I generally run from. Wasps merely have me groping for the Raid….) Beautiful, beautiful poem. You are on my list of reads now….. thank you
Thanks John! Things will rattle around in my head for years before they get written down. 🙂 Glad you liked this one.
“Things will rattle around in my head for years before they get written down.”
Sometimes that is a key to creating finished works — one has some time to arrange things properly before capturing on paper — or nowadays, electronically.
Thanks for another wonderfully crafted poem!