Poetry | Under Ashe

For Betsy, and her Decampment.

And through my mind’s eye I watched the watchings

of the Sparrow that went atwix the grabbing branches

which reached off an Ashe Juniper my grandmother planted when she was young.

Knowing the wind was coming by the way the air tasted

with a likening to autumn’s recursive trips to hiraethic places

that, like her tree,

have burrowed their roots into the passing woman’s ground,

I watched myself—curious—remove my hat and pass under the Ashe.

…

It’s a matter of velocity:

the body’s not a thing to go on and on,

and the soul is meant for lighter rooms. It is built in mind of clearances.

I’ve appropriated His homing call for her,

But she’d’ve taken it all the same, the Scotch reaver blood inveined.

Someone’s left her pasture gate open. I can feel her running beneath me.