Sister Song

Cache Valley

My hands reached for my sister
Our arms laced round each other
til our fingers caught like wires.
Our faces fixed in terror,
pressed together, stared together
at the mink who (now a Wolf, or Ghost)
Glittered, careless staring, glittered sly and bold
Held the way before us
held captive just beyond our familiar country road.
And the distant morning mountains slept like giants in the cold.

Sutherland

In summer, my sisters shared my pillow
Our legs tumbled, arms and long hair straying
past each other’s wide-eyed gaze.
We stared awake through daylight,
wistful twilight, aching Moonlight.
Alert at first we heard them, then sad,
then listlessly:
Locusts delirious in the locust tree–
Our feet tangled in the sheets.
(While tomatoes twined outside,
kissed by the warm Nebraskan tide)…
And at last we sighed, and finally went to sleep.

Providence

I found my sisters pleated and curled
beneath a slow stream of first green leaves.
Our eyes wandered
Returning, and we waited wondering
as Spring became a frozen lake.
We were not afraid.  Not afraid
but empty; as if Christmas had come
and gone before we were awake.
Our baby brother lay still and small,
April-cold in a grave.
Michael in a whisper,  Michael
in each other’s eyes,  Michael
in Heaven.  And us someday, the clock
would patiently say.  We rode on Dad’s shoulders
Brushed our fingers past each sister, and our mother
and the lilac bush a year later
and a year later.

Horse Heaven

Another summer came.
On taller legs we met with wheat fields
hot and yellow in the sun.
And we loved them, though our labor was intense.
We beat time together, all as one.
Our sunburned arms and hoes were stronger,
chests felt deeper, reach seemed longer than a fence.
And the wheat went on the same,
bending, swaying just the same, between the graveled
country roads.  And who could know?
Know we were scared of anything?
Three sisters brave, and strong, and wise.
At least we hoped it with our hoes
And held it in each other’s eyes
In wheat fields stretched and tucked beneath the blue
Blue sky.

Scattered

I had a nightmare that I saw come true.
It slipped past wheat and locust trees,
past country roads and ripened grain;
Pretended first to be a gentle wind
Then snarled and shook and blew
the fences down, and took us all
in a grinning, wicked rain.
But time has passed, and time has thinned
And we’ve dried off and out and through…
We’re here and there; we grew.
Some parts are barely brittle,
or fertile more, or quiet more.
But too here and there; too I miss you
And touch you too little.

Remembering, Blue Mountains

I danced salsa with my sisters.
With my sisters I danced salsa on a giant
On a giant pine tree forest
In a kitchen bright with lamp light
And the moonlit night outside
Was laced with lilac and tomato.
A later time I cried, still cry
At bare feet that touched the hardwood.
Planted, lifted, all as one—
Now we held the country road.  And who would know.
Know we’d forgotten anything?
How to watch, and laugh, and sing
Legs and toes.  Hands and hips move quick and slow
—dance past the clock grown old, love.
And our fingers reach and twine before we go.