A Good Day For A Burning

Grass won’t grow where the barrels were stored.
Three seasons gone; it wasn’t easy.
But then it wasn’t hard.
He cleansed the ditches with burning
And crossed the Rubicon.

Three seasons gone—sprayers, masks, drums that bled.

He took back the cultivator for weeds that don’t

glow in the dark—stooped into his father to embrace

the old ways. With each sluice of the plow

clean dirt is turned. But nothing will grow

on the north side of the shed.

 

Trees denuded by a weakened sun

are stripped bare as the arms of a refugee.

Unplucked apples, like rosy knuckles,

drop to ground and cling

to the bank of a dry creek bed.

 

We warm our hands at the burn barrel.

The jovial days of fall—

the kicking up of leaves—

passed in the night some nights ago.

It was a good day for a burning.

 

But nothing will grow where the barrels were stored

Posted with thanks to Poets and Writers for the writing community they embrace and Earthweal for their open link weekend prompting us to post a favorite poem.  I wrote this while my father was still alive. He liked it.