The wind has stopped.
No jeweled throne in nature’s
yellow pall of sky, and I have
seen the river moving from me
like a lover I have not kissed yet,
who does not know I am here, reclined,
waiting for the cut-down rye to stop
blowing in the cloudless sky.
I have not found the wreath for my grave,
nor my way into the dark of pine forest
behind me. It calls me like the feral cries
of animals mating. I cannot turn my eyes.
I have searched for one open sound to surface
amid the quiet of my days, but not one visits me.
And I am left in the stillness of the air,
hoping something will make him turn back,
that he will come my way.
It only takes one.
Lake Effect contributor Jenny Benjamin is a Milwaukee poet and writer, and author of the novel, This Most Amazing.
