Spoils
So few times
I haven’t had to pretend.
Under the scrub oaks once
one time
when the spider had barely begun
to spin the hex
of change and decay
of change and decay
when above us there was blue
around us there was smoke
and beneath us there was earth
earth that was enough
but even then
there was a buzzing
like a bluebottle
singing his carrion tune
a tiny smut in the sky
a rent in the web
a jet blowing
grey airdirt from its tail
where there should have been
only a noiseless hawk.
Dead people write better poems;
lessons, like all the spoils, are easiest
taken
from the dead.
April 2011
Photo: Blackjack Oak at Sunset, joy ann jones 2011
