Lament of the Land Surveyor

Here it is the last day of November
And I am still working the hills
Without a shirt or a new pair of boots

Like the shade throwing itself
Into the river
A voice in disguise I remember
It's hard to walk a straight line

My father-in-law is coming home too
On his one-eyed tractor
Heading east of a moon
That'll be gone tomorrow

I've dreamed a lot
About a black cat
Dying at the foot of my bed
About cornerstones
I've found in the dark with bare feet

Forties of death and no bearing
Acres of sadness without death
I've dreamed a lot

And waded full gullies
Beneath a ridge where Sally's grandmother
Is shearing roses

And the smell of those flowers
Floating to the foot of the mountain
Reminds me of my hair
Falling on my own father's boots

And the smell of his jacket
And his straight raizor like a lamp
Glowing in the window before me

© Ginny Stanford