Bartonsville

Here in the first clear light
Of April, the last swatch of snow
Percolating into the lawn along
The stone wall by the shed,

I stand watching the boughs
Of the white oaks billowing
Hugely above my head,
The daubed and ruddy robins,

And for the first time in years
I am not lonely for home
Somewhere other than my own
Here in the tattered hills.

It is all one with me
That the fiddleheads unfurl
In a kind of slow crescendo
Through which the moments stream,

That the peepers will trill
Their quarter notes for only
A few weeks more before
Becoming great vats of darkness

Shimmering beneath the stars.
Last night I'd slept with my arm
Around our unborn son,
Solid as a sockeye,

Swimming inside my wife.
Now, this afternoon, I stand
In a light which for hours more
Will be slanting across the lawn

Where the round of time
Gathers us all upon its sure
And ample waters, and all things,
In their season, begin.

Copyright © 2009 Robert Gibb All rights reserved
from What the Heart Can Bear
Autumn House Press
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission