Fallow
Golden the timothy, golden the rod,
a word writ on water, a hand floating air,
gold tongues of pollen gone dry as ghosts—
Golden the God who might make us
this season, cut the cords, bind the wheat,
end the era, all the donkeys, their soft coats—
Something yellow inhabits each autumn,
ladders up the angelica, ladders up the spine—
And a burning begins at the pine hollow.
And a burning quick-tickles my lungs, my flamed
bones. And my breathing quiets to river clouds—
Come down, come down, fall down. Fall low.
Gillian Cummings is the author of The Owl Was a Baker’s Daughter, winner of the 2018 Colorado Prize for Poetry. Read more.