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August
By Leni Hester
There are poppies in the wheat
Red petals smeared like blood
Against golden stalks
There are birds in the air, skimming the breeze for insects
And every day gets hotter, holding its breath for the rain
There is blood in the wheat
Red blood smeared like petals
Against golden stalks
The sky has changed from china to gunmetal
And the rains have stopped for today.
It is a day for knives, for scythes coming out to finish
The work began in cold rain, when the sting of snow
Was still in the mud.
It is a day for the whisper of the blade against the grass,
For the snake that hurries from the falling harvest
And the rain doesn't fall, it mourns.
-5/30/07
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