The True Sound of a Scythe

 

The True Sound of A Scythe

 

It’s true we can drown in waves

of pity, their height & ferocity

lent by the squall only shock can

breed.  The gape-mouth.  The abrupt

letting off, being struck like this,

of the tension’s stretched heft,

an imagined heaviness

of the block & tackle we’ve all been

all our lives

bracing our weight against.  The rope like to

burn the life

line completely away from

our palms so that later

when we’re comparing scars

we’ll only be able to call

to mind the one and only one

it all happened to, the one who now is

losing it all, who stood in the cove

watching something massively tidal

approach them & like all shocked dumb

beasts they can only do so much

of the taking

it all in: the water, the cloud, the oh Sweet

Jesus blow out all at once let go

A wind driven by the local expert Grim

To pluck such freshets rootless

Where they stood when the news

Shook them, shook them and took them,

Took them down with its sighing scythe.