Up Close with Leché
My hands grasp fuzzy teats,
their warmth surprises me.
I dare to squeeze.
Eager to eat grain, the goat
ignores this beginner
so proud of each squirt.
Suddenly, I'm Heidi
a barefoot farm girl
at home with nature . . .
The owner, a true Heidi,
school principal by day,
describes farm life as I milk:
I tell complaining parents
I'd love to stay and listen,
but I have a goat to milk.
Our billy goat smells so bad
in season, we keep him
far away from the house.
A bear smashed our bee hives.
Buffy, our Pyrenees dog,
protected the livestock.
When Buffy got spooked by a rattler
I raked it into a garbage bin
and moved it to the woods.
An eagle grabbed a baby turkey—
I ran and rescued our bird,
raised it in the kitchen.
Then to me, she says,
Leché's grain is gone
and now, she could kick . . .
I release Leché
release my dream —
I want to go home.
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My Mother:
Arrangements in Grey and Black
In the dim basement, my mother
scrubs clothes on a wash board —
how she feels about her life
is written on her face,
but I don't know how to read.
Years pass. She's by an open tub
that agitates clothes. I watch her
feed them to a wringer and want
to help, but she won't let me,
and says it would eat me up.
Then I see her try to hold down
a new Bendix washing machine.
During its spin cycle this Cyclops
rumbles, jumps around and wants out,
out of her basement, out of her job.
Waves
of wind ripple over the grass
like pages flipped on a day calendar
when I see and don't see
my life passing through.
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