Where was it we first forgot the long sounds
of peach orchards in August, or swinging
from the braids of Esperanza’s hair, hounds
howling at the moon, both of us clinging
to that silver mane, the river below
like a promise of the sea and singing,
lapping like a lament. Her hair would grow
on those nights into something forgotten —
the pitchfork, the haystack, the green meadow
that chewed with its mouth open the rotten
tomatoes, the summer’s bones. How the braids
smelt of hickory smoke, coffee, cotton
blossoms on a broken morning. The blade
that cut the ribbons, the water’s cascade.
The ax on the limbs where once the fruit weighed.
