Every Summer,

this field by the highway
thickens with flowers—
but the trees stay bare,

black as if burned
or soaked with rain,
their dark made darker

by the tangled way
they wait, shadeless,
in the vagrant wind.

If you're the one
who wants to heal
everyone's hearts,

pull to the shoulder.
Jump the wire and run
to the land's wound, the trees

like stitches, rough
and sure to scar.
If you're the one,

scare the crows
from their low branch.
Tear out the lace of vines,

the abandoned nests
with their egg-shards
and gray down—

imagine the field
in unbroken bloom
and save us all.

I'm not stopping.
I'm letting hills in the rear-view
bury the grove

as dusk's exhaust
stalls everywhere.
I'm weaving, passing,

eyeing the dash.
As a thousand miles
roll the nines to zeroes,

I'm singing to no one.

Copyright © 2004 Philip Memmer All rights reserved
from Sweetheart, Baby, Darling
Word Press
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission