Ekphrasis by Ryan Warren

The Mowers (When Heart Beats as One) by Granville Redmond, 1907.

Ekphrasis: The Mowers (When Hearts Beat as One)

There are times you long
for the sepia'd world.
The gentle shift
of the swinging blade
cutting cleanly
the tall, falling grasses
rhythms aligned:
your pounding heart,
salty rivulets running
to the point of
your clockwork elbow
the sound of
her labouring breath
behind you
tall backed, beautiful
in her gathering
beautiful in her releasing
the sweet smell
of the ripe and fallen hay
beautiful in the glance
over your damp shoulder
and catching the air around her
alive with dust, pollen
every mote afire in
the low, late and golden sun
and you, cutting cleanly
when this is all the work
there is to do in the world
to swing true, keep your rhythm
cut cleanly, gather quickly
hearts beating, ahead of
the coming, the darkening
the ending sky.
There are times we long
for our sepia'd world
but do we ever know it
when we are in it.

Ryan Warren

Ryan Warren lives with his family in the San Francisco Bay Area. His poetry and other writings have previously appeared or are forthcoming in Lost Coast Review, Wilderness House Literary Review, The Mindful Word, Anchorage Daily News, U.S. 1 and Plum Tree Tavern.