Prairie Girl

Poem Palette: Napkin notes from an embryonic poem flash: 1989

Angel-air
Umber stair
Oh how your hair blows about
Gold cascade of cirrus wisp …
Wind and wheat, Pewter heat
Hot old oak, corn and oat
Stuff of twine, stuff of air
Wind and hay
Are blended there.

and what it became…

1990 Prairie Girl:

In Oklahoma, oak trees keep their leaves
(Albeit that they look like mud)
through the stripping winter blast,
even to the time when Red Bud bud.

So, when all the leaves that will fall - fall
Into the bags we’ve placed to catch 'em,
We flee, to a land of wafting umber,
Under the wild sky
Where light, and line, and twine emerge
In a surge of tall grass habitat.

Twenty miles west of town,
We round the river bend and then
exit, “S”ing upward
into Prue, through these hills of calico –
Oh! What variety of brown.

Down a copper canyon
Up a chocolate hill,
Allemande left to the Cinnamon hill.
Bow to your partner, kiss her cheek,
Park the car and let wind speak!

--
The sweep before our eyes is
all staccato, shredded wheat--
the stuff of cereal
ethereal,
with toast...
an undulating ocean
made of wooden grass;

The waves go out like weaving rain,
We hear the crash of distant surf --
Or sometimes – with the heavy wind
The sound of padded bamboo clicking,
Every thing is moving but
the stalwart rocks
or blackened remnants of hardwood trees, strewn Bold
like cracks on the sky.

The day goes late
With wash of rye, marmalade and gold

And Kerry looks o’r the prairie
Her hair washing back
Like these heavenly weeds.

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