Poem: A Moment's Doyenne

 

A Moment’s Doyenne

 

goaded by a toenail of nor’easter,

Maine’s thankless sky struggled against

the premise of dawn, muffling it with

cold clouds sopped in gravy.

the white tongues of South Lubec Cemetery

were poised to lick, frozen,

as they had been since eighteen such and so,

on the last syllables of futile names.

 

anemia taxed the land, had sapped

grasses and shriveled yarrow,

corroded dock into prongs of rust,

and bent trees till they were nothing more

than bruised canes waiting

for giant ice fists.

 

it was through this bleakness that the old woman

accosted my car, spitting an

oatmeal of leaves.  every morning

her lumbering stride lifted

my hand to wave; and she

anonymous and fleeting

waved back.

 

but not this day,

eroding both actors and props

with its flaxen whips.

i barely glimpsed wetted eyes, cheeks

haggard from blasts, galumphs of

beige fleece, a bonnet so

bland it endorsed the ground.

==============================