THE COURTSHIP OF WINDS

Shannon Cuthbert

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Anthropocentric

 

A long-legged girl with 

Hair down a tree like purple shoots.

Her walk through a meadow

Parts seed pods and queens

Of lace and honeybee shimmering 

Heat waves over the horse fence.

Crabapples too, pucker

Her mouth in retort,

She is lazy laden with summer’s end

And pollen clouds inhaling poison

In her eyes so senses

Blue and blur to their low-grade magic,

Turn the fields from risk 

To a churn of enchantment and possible witchery.

Autumn steals the thought from her mind

As roots stretching

Their way through an unyielding earth.

As somewhere long-legged boys

And grasshoppers fret

And pace, awaiting her parting the tall new grass,

Awaiting the thought of her 

Before they’ve met.

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