The Call

 There is moonlight

on corn stubble

by the side

of a highway.

The moonlight

is a Gypsy

a profligate

reflected child

and yet it kisses

the corn stubble, denied all wandering

except into death

where it has already gone

by the side of the highway

which only runs

east or west

north or south

this way or that,

never varying,

like an office worker who has been there

for far too long.

My bones are a tarmac

that I have traveled on from earliest memory

to this very moment.

I am an old barn, gone gray.

No one touches me

and I touch no one

except with these poems.

I write them

to keep from screaming.

I wonder,

where does this road end?

Am I a cornhusk doll

in the hands of time,

or am I moonlight--

a messenger from a mother a million miles away?

I have been a child,

a partner,

a parent,

a friend,

a cautionary tale

and rain in the desert. 

Now I am tired

though I still love leaves

dogs,

sunrise,

books,

poetry.

If I lay down in the moonlight

between the old rows

near where the semi trucks rumble 

going here

or there

could I rise

into firmament?

Is all of this some kind of holy circle

or would I just turn to dust

inside my flannel and wool?

I will ask the corn.

I will ask the traffic.

I will ask the moonlight.

I will ask the night

that has wrapped me from cradle to grave

and if it answers

I may get up in the morning

and call you--

yes, it's me

and I am as surprised as you are. 

________