Poem for Saturday

Coastal Plain
By Kathryn Stripling Byer

The only clouds
forming are crow clouds,

the only shade, oaks
bound together in a tangle of oak

limbs that signal the wind
coming, if there is any wind

stroking the flat
fields, the flat

swatch of corn.
Far as anyone’s eye can see, corn’s

dying under the sky
that repeats itself either as sky

or as water
that won’t remain water

for long on the highway: its shimmer
is merely the shimmer

of one more illusion that yields
to our crossing as we ourselves yield

to our lives, to the roots
of our landscape. Pull up the roots

and what do we see but the night
soil of dream, the night

soil of what we call
home. Home that calls

and calls
and calls.

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Last laundry isn't folded yet but most of the other chores are done. Kids played with older son's friend Omar, who is leaving for England and then Bangladesh for a month in the morning; I tried to keep my head up, as whatever is going on with my lymph nodes hasn't gone down and I'm tired and stiff and sore and really hoping this is all stress and I'm not coming down with anything. Had dinner with parents, finalized lists of who's bringing what. Half-watched Animal Planet to which the kids got addicted while traveling; this time it was the San Francisco animal patrol and Meerkat Manor.


Something I hope to see lots of in coming days...a laughing gull hanging out in the water.

Saturday on the way east we are stopping at the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum in St. Michaels to see the replica of John Smith's shallop. Then it's on to Bethany!