THE WEB OF THE EGG

  by Dick Bakken

A child balances
an egg on her palm. Here
she stands, in a field of flowers. The sky
opens so blue above her. At the edge of our field
her mare flicks its ears and glances around. This girl’s shoes spark
like a swan lifting its wings. The web of the egg begins to
flutter and unravel. From beyond
these flowers an echo
of the owl slips
into her throat and she thinks she sees
her mare sliding away like the barn. O but, listeners, it is she
who is falling out over a cliff, floating like a saint
above some scattered horseman.
Humphrey! she calls. And
the wind calls again
Humphrey!
She is his song
rotating above the cracks of his eyes. She cups that
heart of his with two hands. Night’s moon ascends in a nimbus of
whinnies. The mystery spins out so well
from her silvered fingers
Oh! and Oh! and Oh! the horseman’s stars begin streaming
back up into the sky. You are so beautiful!
this torch of
a child breathes over our field,
her white horse having risen out of the flowers.
Back deep in the barn, where her footsteps almost flicker,
this raptured girl whispers, breezing
the horseman’s secret into her mare’s face.
Humphrey! she blows. And the wind sighs again, O
you listeners—again as her mare, fragrant as the flora about us,
lays that huge head into her heart
and shivers like the final
star blooming back
up into night.