Rain falls before the earth is formed here
then everywhere the frogs cry, and the swamp
swims closer through the reeds, water, and mud.
This begins on my side of a mountain with clouds
just like a fire burning slow and deep in the ground.
This is what they say coal is or was, and not magic
or religion, or the wild dark belly of a dragon.
And I won’t walk inside this shut down mine.
Trash heaps with blue-tailed lizards along the road.
A huge rusty axle is gouging down between stumps.
Must have been a monster machine hulked dead.
Never was safe. Now I start listening for ghosts.
They’ll run at me like preachers with headlamps.
They’ll push everything at me as if I want their job.
Published in Cider Press Review, Volume 27, Issue 1.
Clyde Kessler lives in Radford, Virginia with his wife Kendall and their son Alan. Several years ago they added an art studio to their home and named it Towhee Hill. In 2017, Cedar Creek published his book of poems, Fiddling At Midnight’s Farmhouse, which Kendall illustrated.
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