Give Us This Day
July and the ink
of blackcap raspberries
splatters ditches
and clearcuts: green
banks singing, my tongue
rocking inside my mouth.
Who blessed by this dark
sugar could stay quiet?
Ants wander drunk
into my bucket, across
the visible world
that feeds us, that makes
an offering each day:
beach plum or pawpaw,
morel or puffball, even
the spider-legs
of purslane
and the sharp
bite of sorrel.
Todd Davis is the author of seven books of poetry, most recently Coffin Honey and Native Species, both published by Michigan State University Press. Read more.
“Give Us This Day” was first published in In the Kingdom of the Ditch (Michigan State University Press, 2013).