Saturday, July 20, 2019

Poetry: Where Deer Sleep

Where Deer Sleep

That place where the Moon
goes from whole to slithered,
bites of dust, smiles of yellow
rock, strange toenail shapes amidst
a royal navy blue canvas of stars,
growing dimmer the closer they are.

Just hidden enough to be found in
the bushes, sea urchin green, springing
up as coverage for all the earthlings which
do not sleep

In front of a thousand oaks, a family of
Whitetail Deer, each resting on a
pod of grass indented like the forehead of
an infant. There is a nakedness to this ritual,
a non-terrestriality, signs of the Creator’s indivisibility.

A place where deer sleep. Beside the specter
of daffodils blooming in untimely silences, made of
atoms, bones held by the same basic power source
of gravitational waves that only deer listen to.

Wrapped together for some reason, around the Sun, stretching
out into space, atomic reactions to the night. From sunrise to
sunset, turning away from the hours traveling across the sky.

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George Cassidy Payne is an independent writer, domestic violence counselor, and adjunct instructor in the humanities at Finger Lakes Community College.

George's blogs, essays, letters, poems, and photographs have been published in a wide variety of national and international outlets such as USA Today, The Atlantic, The Wall Street Journal, National Public Radio, The Buffalo News, Albany Times-Union, Syracuse Post Standard, Rochester Democrat & Chronicle, The Toronto Star, The Minority Reporter, Chronogram Journal, Ovi Magazine, CounterPunch, Moria Poetry Journal, Ampersand Literary Review, Adirondack Daily Enterprise, and more.

George's first book of poetry, A Time Before Teachers, is available at Amazon.com.


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