Rachel Becker

Field

You were the stage on which my friends and I played
lotus eaters, sucked down wine from stolen jugs,

read tarot cards by candlelight and tried
to summon the dead, where we hexed everyone we hated.

Through a curtain of trees, classmates kissed and smoked.
I wanted what they had. Instead I had a curfew

and only got your gloaming, a quarter-lit sky.
Unseen, I came to you on my knees, reciting Millay

to the air like a seaside cure, three long mountains and a wood.
I turned, and your dry grass scissored the backs of my legs

and you were all I could see. When I left for college, you were for sale.
I thought for sure you’d be bought up by a country club or company,

your hedges manicured and flood lit, raggedy edges beautified
into trellises. But when I visit you with my own children,

you are still whole, still up for any dare, light as a feather.
It’s pouring when I let my kids loose, and their raincoats

brighten your perimeter, like fireflies in a storm. 

Back to Issue XIV…