Valentine’s Day
the
raven bled
black
upon cerulean sky--
circling, crying, quoting
to we mere mortals scattered below,
who weaved a barbed-wire way betwixt
securely tamped locust posts and across
rocky river ground.
black
upon cerulean sky--
circling, crying, quoting
to we mere mortals scattered below,
who weaved a barbed-wire way betwixt
securely tamped locust posts and across
rocky river ground.
the
Angus cattle flooded
black
upon winter riverside pasture--
lowing, sparring, churning
their hallowed ground
to cold-molten mud,
and we mere mortals
bowed
our unworthy heads in futile epiphany:
black
upon winter riverside pasture--
lowing, sparring, churning
their hallowed ground
to cold-molten mud,
and we mere mortals
bowed
our unworthy heads in futile epiphany:
when
we are gone, lowered
and churned into
our hallowed earth’s brown blood,
the raven will circle, cry, declare
“I am the master of these fields;
I am the keeper of these bones"
and churned into
our hallowed earth’s brown blood,
the raven will circle, cry, declare
“I am the master of these fields;
I am the keeper of these bones"
The
Farmer's Right Hand
For
Rodney
The farmer's contagious Monday anxiety
seeps through the John Deere tractor cab's silage-scented atmosphere
incinerating his hired hand, who, in quiet faithfulness, rides beside him.
seeps through the John Deere tractor cab's silage-scented atmosphere
incinerating his hired hand, who, in quiet faithfulness, rides beside him.
There is never enough time.
A muscle-building, mechanically-inclining
year-and-a-half of working, learning, adapting beside him--
shoveling feedlot feed bunks, tall-stacking square bales in hay barns,
stretching and tacking barbed wire across and into locust posts--
has implicitly taught her
that when he wants a task done,
the farmer will either bear the task's cross himself
or hand her an unlined three-by-five--
scrawled with black ballpoint;
pulled gentlemanly from his left shirt pocket--
dictating her mucked, mired, muddied,
manure-splattered fate.
year-and-a-half of working, learning, adapting beside him--
shoveling feedlot feed bunks, tall-stacking square bales in hay barns,
stretching and tacking barbed wire across and into locust posts--
has implicitly taught her
that when he wants a task done,
the farmer will either bear the task's cross himself
or hand her an unlined three-by-five--
scrawled with black ballpoint;
pulled gentlemanly from his left shirt pocket--
dictating her mucked, mired, muddied,
manure-splattered fate.
Night Vigil
"...but now
a more dismal and fitting day dawns, and a different race of creatures awakes
to express the meaning of Nature there." - Thoreau
Past midnight
conversation
begins always
with the same interrogating question:
softly hollered from above high,
softly hollered from above high,
cloaked in full
moon's milk,
illuminated by
flicker-flicker fireflies--
"Who?",
"Who?",
which on
before-dawn's new breaking
becomes the
land's most melancholic wondering
being asked to
one unsatisfied dying-ember soul,
the unknown
violating trespasser,
lurking the
twilight's gone-gleaming
led by
sword-wielding Orion,
haunted by your
spreading death-knell wings
through Life's
criss-crossed tangled woods-web
while again you
maniacally-and-double beg
"Who? Who?"--:
"Who? Who?"--:
Who dares
trespass, break boundary into
your darkened
forested dominion,
arch-angelically you dwell?
Who falls prey
to your graceful, missiled predator-swoop?
"Who? Who?"
"Who? Who?"
you ask, wise
and dominant,
from
skeleton-branch perches,
your razored
talons warrior-braced for war-flight
when the
unsatisfied dying-ember soul,
the violating
trespasser
aimlessly
wanders into your farsighted godliness
answering,
humbled with pitiful self-admittance,
"I don't know; I don't know".
"I don't know; I don't know".
Thou Shalt Glow
the
Artist—painting necrotic portraits of a phossy-jawed human race
dancing beneath a fluoresced radium sun;
swimming in cesium-137 lagoons;
building isotopic snowmen in strontium-90-laced atmospheric cocaine—
dancing beneath a fluoresced radium sun;
swimming in cesium-137 lagoons;
building isotopic snowmen in strontium-90-laced atmospheric cocaine—
licks
his camel hair paintbrush’s tip to straighten, to smooth, the half-life
bristles.
Purchase Backwoods and Back Words
About Nicole Yurcaba
Nicole
Yurcaba hails from a long line of Ukrainian immigrants, West Virginia mountain
folk, academics, artists and writers. She began reading and writing at age
three, and that first love of literature and words has propelled her into the
arms of numerous publications: VoxPoetica,
The Atlanta Review, The Dead Mule School of Southern Literature,
Philomathean, Bluestone Review, Floyd
County Moonshine and many others. In December 2013, Yurcaba graduate from
Tiffin University's Masters of Humanities program and also published her first
poetry, photography and short story collection, Backwoods and Back Words, available on Amazon. She serves as
English faculty at Eastern WV Community and Technical College.
Connect with Nicky
Thanks for reading! As always, please feel free to leave questions/comments
below.
If you love poetry, check out these posts: Scott
Burkett, Angela
M. Carter, Jeanette
Powers and T.L.
Washington.
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