for Norma
When I arrived at her door, she called from her chair,
Don’t take off your shoes—
but I did out of habit, sinking
into the couch, bewildered
with half-finished
poems—mostly, she let them walk into the dark
but one time she said, A poem wants life.
I’d stand beneath cottonwood trees, listening
to the wind as it rose through the tops,
the silver-green leaves
quivering, clapping.
Some days I don’t know what it means, I begin
littering the floor
with the old darkness
but when I go out to the fields
here is a mystery, her voice
which has passed through this world
returns in last light,
blackbirds whirl over the cornfields,
even the stubble is golden.
1 thought on “On Writing”
What a clear tale, welcomes us right in, with a fine ending.