AS IF HE WERE

As if he were the moon he pulled gently
the stalks the stems the leaves that follow
the flowers their pistils the stamen teased
coaxed with his long ethereal fingers

day or night even when his powers waned
a slim curvature of light but he was
not the moon she realized and she
lay down with the wind in a ditch

in that thick hot summer nothing would
bring her up again it seemed all memory
of his coming were some fanciful myth
some pattern of rising and falling

following the sun he was the moon
said the wind he was not said the ditch
and she ached and she arched and sighed
and the ground cracked open looking for him