Things as It Is

The Hill Towns of Connecticut

Dust motes fell from the rafters
all the way down into hay spiced

with manure, molasses in the feed,

and always a man, a stable hand
or somebody’s friend.

Girls and horses in the hill towns
of Connecticut—

such freedom, unimaginable now.

Bareback, still flat-chested,
kid-muscles wedding the beasts’,

we rode through open fields
to the hole of shadow at the woods’ edge,

a tunnel just greening with leaves
in still-closed infant clusters,

though the red buds of the maples
were already falling.

We tracked woodsmoke
to someone’s secret camp.

The wife was bent over the hood.
They had a fire going, down to coals.

The husband met my eyes. He looked sad.
He looked away.

I almost forgot about that.

That, and the man who appeared
in a dust beam

to a daydreaming girl with a currycomb,

and slow-danced her up against the horse,
holding her hand against him

beneath his hand,
saying How, oh how does it feel?

Just say out loud how it feels and I’ll stop.