Hobble Creek Review
| Lesley Doyle |
False Spring
February 2009, two weeks after an ice storm.
The trees still remember the way it felt.
Their scars echo the bone-snaps of exhaustion
that rang out when they could no longer bear
the weight of all that ice and light.
But today is unseasonably warm—
dead leaves bird-hop in quick circles
while the birds themselves gurgle brightly,
preening in the bare branches, pecking
at the wet patchwork of my flowerbeds,
which will remain un-sewn squares of dirt
for at least two more months.
I know this false spring will soon end,
give way to more days that see my hands
drive themselves into the finger-highways of gloves
but the birds don’t, and I am glad
I do not have the language to tell them,
I, who sit here writing this poem, counting faces
in the clouds while my winter-white skin
blooms pink, I, who still have enough
audacity to pray, and to believe it is heard.
Song of Late June
The sharp summer-scent of cut grass
all around: dying exhalations from a new path
curving through the field. Clusters
of Queen Anne’s Lace cling like snow
to the fence row, where the forbidding twists
of barbed wire bite deep into each post.
A pollen-heavy breeze brushes
by the slender stalks of wheat,
their backs bowed, heavy heads dipped low.
As I move among them,
the rough whisper of their prayers
brush against my ankles.
The jeweled spines of crickets flash
as they leap before my footfalls,
the chafing of their wiry limbs singing, singing,
a song of quiet wildness that echoes
within the listening marrow of my bones.
February 2009, two weeks after an ice storm.
The trees still remember the way it felt.
Their scars echo the bone-snaps of exhaustion
that rang out when they could no longer bear
the weight of all that ice and light.
But today is unseasonably warm—
dead leaves bird-hop in quick circles
while the birds themselves gurgle brightly,
preening in the bare branches, pecking
at the wet patchwork of my flowerbeds,
which will remain un-sewn squares of dirt
for at least two more months.
I know this false spring will soon end,
give way to more days that see my hands
drive themselves into the finger-highways of gloves
but the birds don’t, and I am glad
I do not have the language to tell them,
I, who sit here writing this poem, counting faces
in the clouds while my winter-white skin
blooms pink, I, who still have enough
audacity to pray, and to believe it is heard.
Song of Late June
The sharp summer-scent of cut grass
all around: dying exhalations from a new path
curving through the field. Clusters
of Queen Anne’s Lace cling like snow
to the fence row, where the forbidding twists
of barbed wire bite deep into each post.
A pollen-heavy breeze brushes
by the slender stalks of wheat,
their backs bowed, heavy heads dipped low.
As I move among them,
the rough whisper of their prayers
brush against my ankles.
The jeweled spines of crickets flash
as they leap before my footfalls,
the chafing of their wiry limbs singing, singing,
a song of quiet wildness that echoes
within the listening marrow of my bones.
Lesley Doyle is a senior at Western Kentucky University, majoring in English
literature and minoring in creative writing. She is an editor for WKU’s student
publication, Zephyrus, and most recently her poems have appeared in
Mississippi Crow and Oak Bend Review.
literature and minoring in creative writing. She is an editor for WKU’s student
publication, Zephyrus, and most recently her poems have appeared in
Mississippi Crow and Oak Bend Review.
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