Before Anything
…is air and the smallest
stirring—leaf against leaf,
an insect or two teetering
on a grass blade. The dawn pushing
through to find us on a July day,
just after waking, just past sleep.
The vast green blur begins to differentiate
into many greens: willow and juniper,
olive green and sage. Peat moss
and fern and all their intimate relations,
and somewhere in the shadows,
the black green of decay.
And just across the river—apple orchard green.
Nascent fruits that will grow, transform in shape,
hue into harvest. It could take a lifetime to name
every green and what it can do. Even here,
in this moment of just born light.
SUSAN JEFTS’s full-length collection of poetry, Breathing Lessons, will be published this summer by Shanti Arts. Read more.
“Before Anything” was originally published in Birchsong: Poetry Centered In Vermont, Volume II (The Blueline Press, 2018).