Boy Remembers in the Field / Raymond Knister

Boy Remembers in the Field

What if the sun comes out
And the new furrows do not look smeared?

This is April, and the sumach candles
Have guttered long ago.
The crows in the twisted apple limbs
Are as moveless and dark.

Drops on the wires, cold cheeks,
The mist, the long snorts, silence . . .
The horses will steam when the sun comes;
Crows go, shrieking.

Another bird now; sweet . . .
Pitiful life, useless,
Innocently creeping
On a useless planet
Again.

If any voice called, I would hear?
It has been the same before.
Soil glistens, the furrow rolls, sleet shifts, brightens.

~~
Raymond Knister
1923

[Poem is in the public domain in Canada and the European Union]

Raymond Knister (by George Dance)