soil

when i wrote this for dirt, i just pulled on the words. i just pulled them like weeds, trying to make something worthwhile. but now, now this is how i feel. now this is like a premonition come to light.

digging


      if only you could
      take me out
      instead of back in
      Red House Painters


here are one or two empty
jars of cinnamon, as holy relics
offer their mysteries

powdered brown, the last
cling softly, shy
as the dirt on roots
exposed to light. a fear
of digging will seize me here

a shift of soil or crumbled
rock, spaces beneath
my fingers curled like prayer

and dusty as monuments. these hands
of scratches and red-scrubbed
knuckles, bonds of paleontology
to sift layers and choke
sand. the farmers plant their seeded

rows; they wait for pullulation.
i dig past memories and vacancies,
weeding where i am buried.

.

and i could not have done it without her beauty.