Fieldstones

Glacial

buried beneath

epochs of decay

they

mark the margins

of this field

exhumed

fitted

one atop another

prominence

to hollow

held by heft

instead of mortar.

Mother

often I wished for you

a tenderness

that could break

you open

like the geodes

we’d sometimes unearth

exposing

all the jagged

crystals.

Ophidiophobia

Every fear

has its proper

name

in the heart’s

compendium;

this morning 

I surprised

one

sunning beside

the fieldstone wall

a thick

stippled

question mark

I blindly answered

with

the garden spade—

every darkness

with

its perfect

reason.