Aletha
Trent Busch
Tom Howard/Margaret Reid Poetry Contest 2017 (view all the winners)
Honorable Mention, Margaret Reid, Traditional Verse
Scythe on shoulder, Time
comes to cut the meadow,
heavy pipe in mouth, smoking
Five Brothers tobacco.
Popping daisies, laying
clover in swaths, he will
not be done until he
mows the timothy too.
How you stood in yellow
dress in the swale of spring
beeches, what kind of flower
pinned sideways in your hair.
Now he stands gaunt, tilting
blade against whetstone, guarding
the glass jug of water
he has hidden in the grass.
Dusk, he will be finished,
curved snath on shoulder, deep
in dark woods awaited by
the king's own carriage.
How you made me ashamed
of my advances, your
face trembling, your eyes shy
enough to quiet deer.
