land[E]scape by Cyndi MacMillan

Gray and Gold by John Rogers Cox, 1943.

land[E]scape
 
Deafening, the static of departure.
The dirt road squeals
though you keep under the limit.
 
A cramped silence refuses to veer --
almost wears the gild right off
wheatfields
 
as the truck deepens a rut
started generations ago.
Somewhere, a turn was missed.
 
Somehow, a fatherly confession
about the last piece of pie
had come to mean
 
there is nothing left to be said.
 
Once again, I leave home,
pass a good harvest of telephone poles
planted in their ramrod row;
 
each line was purposely raised,
shoulders its share of tough questions,
tolerates all connections.
 
Some were not raised well enough.
Dear, we drive for a long stretch, not one word
to shelter us
 
until, I point and you nod.
Gears shift
as we steer clear of those tiresome warnings
 
to brave a freeborn supercell.



Cyndi MacMillan

Cyndi MacMillan poetry has recently appeared in Grain Magazine and the Fieldstone Review.  Her verse, short fiction and novel-in-progress resentfully compete for her attention.  She lives in New Hamburg, Ontario, home to North America’s largest working water wheel. Coffee and family allow ideas to percolate.