Pamela Hobart Carter
Sown
after “Incipience,” by Adrienne Rich
To breathe, to sleep below a safe roof
while flame dances across forests
through nights when much is done
to stem all dreams
to parry the heat and fuel
that waits for ignition
molecules of ash
invisible
to numb the aching burn
of every limb in the land
Much will be sown.
Much will be sown. Compose yourself,
measure by measure, note by note,
study the flicker of feathers
in your backyard, count starlings
allowing visits of small yellow birds
before taking their tastes
of abundance presented
this garden
this feast
Editor’s Note: What Rough Beast welcomes poems in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The usual editorial guidelines apply—we don’t generally like poems that dwell overmuch on the shortcomings of the Trump administration—It simply does not usually make for good poetry. Poems may allude to the administration’s catastrophic negligence in responding to this pandemic, but we’d rather read about your personal experience of the pandemic than a critique of the administration’s response.
Pamela Hobart Carter is the author, with Arleen Williams, of twelve short books in easy English, published on the imprint they founded, No Talking Dogs. Carter’s poems have appeared in Barrow Street, Chaos, The Ekphrastic Review, Eunoia Review, Halcyon, The Pangolin Review, Red Eft Review, The Seattle Star, The Seattle Times, Tilde, and Washington Poetic Routes, among other journals and periodicals.
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