The Ride

The Ride

In March the wind knocks
From the night its low
Train mourn
And the house shakes
Until the stove pipe
Rattles its rusty teeth
And I hang to the edge
Of my bed for the bucking
Ride into spring;
Not the spring of your dreams
But a common nightmare
Of trampled woodpiles
And mud, close cabin madness,
Waking from hibernation
Wearing stiffness,
Thumbed seed catalogs
And a hunger for
That slice of green,
A tonic for the bitter kernel
Resting at my liver.