The Bride One Summer Evening

Waiting for the grind of tires, barefoot,
not sure just where I ought to snip, or if,
his rose bushes long planted, long ignored,
I heard an unfamiliar cry and turned 

to face the moon.  It rose from ruddy clay,
uncanny, earthy, red, full, and so low
my shears could almost reach.  Instead I found
the perfect angle for those clean smooth cuts,

goodbyes to last year's unseen crimson blooms.
I severed thorny brown from green to let
red growth replace the woman I had been.
The moon still loomed orange above the pines,

but faded, before he got home, to white.
He said that whippoorwill could whoop all night.






Cumberland Poetry Review 18.1 (Fall 1998)

copyright Sarah Schneewind 1998