Michigan

Michigan

From Northern lands
of dip and heath and peak,
home of the great lake
where the mighty meets the creek
with a finger and makes
the tiny river quake,

where if the robins
linger or flee
in a flash of ginger wing
depends on if they see
the winter just ahead,
or the winter still asleep;

where, golden brown,
sometimes the road extends
facing a low sun,
and others, cuts the glen’s
emerald, lush lawn
in lazy bends;

on tanned, muddy ground,
down rows of ochre wheat,
past country fields
and tall country oaks,
bent like knotted hands,
past spinning windmill spokes,

through early morning
a bus journeys south,
the horizon leaking gold,
gold bouncing off of steel,
stirring the crumbling road
of dusty, chestnut soil.

down straights, up curves,
and stops, still, as
a mother waves wild
dreams and wishes
to her child
And a father turns away.

© 1998 Sarah Spain