SONNET
by Kenneth E. Harrison, Jr.
Time as faint curvature a river slices through
distant hips of fields as though witness dust
grant us prayer on the crossing under sky
dissolved across thrush and the begonia’s grip
when we sought beyond the skin’s rush above
the smell of pears never forgotten the surface
of our parting a remote orchard the days soak
whose hand touches another where music gusts
astonished in complete breaths our own image
ran out from summer’s moistened room lighted
we’ve been loved and backed away how sound
prolongs a shudder of wings risen from ditches
splashed with clover I am not one person one
nature climbed the rise with you my failed oath—
Kenneth E. Harrison, Jr.’s poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Denver Quarterly, Drunken Boat, elimae, Margie, Orange Quarterly, Packingtown Review, Pleiades, Spittoon, Sukoon, TYPO, Word For/Word and elsewhere. He teaches English composition, Literature, and poetry at Webster University and Florissant Valley Community College in St. Louis.
