The man who walked to the end of the sidewalk
was looking for a dog–
a dog trailing a chain leash with a red imitation
leather handle, and he found Continue reading “Blue Jay”
Category: Poems
Poetry from Oklahoma
Dear Winter,
You hold the prints of my terrier dog Socks, the dog of my son’s childhood who died after the ice storm of 2007. You held her prints for a week after she was gone. I still remember walking by them when I went around the house. They were in the dark place where the sun doesn’t reach beneath the southern edge of the carport. You didn’t take her, but I will always remember when she left because of that path you kept after she was gone. You are a season for imprints. Continue reading “Dear Winter,” Winter Conversation
Dandelion in winter
Has lost its head
It did not roll down a hill
Nor drown in an ocean
Though the ocean may have
Longed for it
Sumac seeds and wildflower,
Pine cone and pine needle,
All watched
And said nothing.
–Shaun Perkins
My junior class collected things on the ground outside the other day and made poems out of them.
Ballad of the Rolling Hill
I had an old man, a child, a cat, and a dog.
Lost them in the middle of a country song,
when a hill came rolling down,
soft, but tearing up the ground.
Now my head is rolling ’round,
zigzagging away at any sound. Continue reading “Ballad of the Rolling Hill”
To Day
Here is what I bring to you, Day:
A restlessness haunting the hours,
Like the moon behind the trees—here,
And here, now here. A belief
In the core, the place of origin,
Creek water walked in as a child,
The dirt tracks toy Corvettes made,
My son’s laughter exploding
From a pile of leaves we never
Gathered in fall. I give this all up Continue reading “To Day”
Security of the Safe
She scattered the seeds wide, far from her, to the edge of the furrowed land,
beyond garden, beyond home and the human notion of property,
Into the land of other and the stories she did not shape
Yet had a hand in the telling because
We all have a hand in the telling
Of our lives,
The lie to pass on, Continue reading “Security of the Safe”
Rural Oklahoma Museum of Poetry 