It's Like That (Day 264)

It isn’t a slow song that gets to me, 

but the shuffle of boots across

a sawdust floor, dry as august 

weeds, screen door banging against 

the frame from time to time, 

red dust coating on the chairs. 

It’s the way a certain singer’s voice 

breaks just there, at the edge of that 

single note, and how the steel guitar 

falls away from the band to sway 

through a slow swing solo. 

The beer is just okay. The crowd, 

rough as brand new, 

never-been-washed 501s.

But that boy, with the silver band 

around the crown of his dark brown hat? 

The way his eyes darken as he plays, 

and the skin at the nape of my neck 

tingles in anticipation? He brings me 

back, and back again.

It’s like the shuffle of bare feet on 

a wide-plank kitchen floor, the scent of 

strong coffee brewing on the frost-bitten 

edge of a long autumn morning. It’s like 

the sunlight glazing each falling leaf 

against the backdrop of a cedar forest, 

so the trees seem to be raining fire. 

Yeah. It’s like that.

(c) 2017, by Hannah Six

Photo: Charles C Pierce, Inside the Yellow Aster Saloon, Randsburg, California, ca.1900

Dripping Words (Day 260)

old-fashioned roses 

russet pathway 

wends  hard-edged 

encircling a bench 

we chose in glossy 

April’s warmth  coffee 

cups in hand  legs 

splayed casually  

sunshine fierce  naïve 

and future-bound  

doubtless   in cocoons  

humming and content  

dripping words that 

never mattered as much 

as what we meant

(c) 2017, by Hannah Six

Image: Pixabay

Harvest Time (Day 248)

Some gathering 

pilgrims set forth 

in pairs, gathering baskets

and woolen clothes like clouds, 

departing at the edge 

of night, the moon’s high 

spirits straighten the road 

before them, winding 

around their ankles like 

a hungry cat. Impractical 

brimstone singes 

falling apples as they land,

purifying the blushing skins

of summer’s gritty haze.

Harvest time, the farm-stand days

glow like boys in love, 

newly bright, buoyant. Once 

clumsy, landing heavily on their 

youth, this tapered light 

now liquifies, they preen 

and joust. Love rises unfairly, 

comfortable lies settle in 

heavy folds where frozen 

stars swarm overhead. 

Blue sadness maintains 

silence among the lost, 

their easy brilliance cracking, 

snapping loudly under the burden

of too-soon hardened hearts.

(c) 2017, by Hannah Six

Image: UK National Archives (public domain)