Sonnet
From Prairie Schooner.
Terror of loneliness is over now.
Sharp in the early morning, one the cry
Of birds in the low pastures, or a plow
Poised on the empty furrow, was a pry
Turning the heart clean over. As a stone
Rain-washed and sun-warmed is reluctant turned
Upward to show the darker undertone—
The blind side from the sun—so I have burned
Under the summer of too many years
Stark in the open starfall and the drouth
Not to have peace, not to be free from fears,
Done with the lonely memory of your mouth.
Desires as fierce as hunger—one by one
They all grow still—like old hawks in the sun.
Reprinted from Prairie Schooner Vol IX No 4 (Winter 1936) by permission of University of Nebraska Press. Copyright 1936 by the Wordsmiths of Sigma Upsilon.