E. W. Shaffer

Golden World
(First 19 lines of 31)

A green worm smaller than a grain of rice
wiggles on a spur of goldenrod in front of my frowning face
and I am amazed to have noticed it
looking past the bouquet at the driving rain.
Over its entire body, like sprinkles on a candy apple,
are shredded pieces of the tiny golden flowers,
camouflage obviously to deceive creatures more
menacing than I. Confident perhaps in its deception,
it weaves around spikes of dried blossoms
on its way to spikes of fresh ones, I imagine,
then stops, and with one end attached, waves to me
by circling its other around in the air
like a happy child. I, the curious oaf angel,
help my pencil nudge it free and watch it fall
from its perfumed domain to one as flat as paper
in black and white and land with a tap among these words.
Motionless for a moment, stunned perhaps,
it gives me another moving circles wave
as if signaling for a rescue....




Tender Thighs
-------— For Janice

Red swollen blisters ooze. Icky fluid
covers long previously sexy legs
and plasters previously soft smooth skin

knees to tender thighs.
Ankles to waist, red itchy bumps.
A fun hike down the mountain from the old mine

gone bad. Trapped by rugged rocks above
and a choice: a drop-off cliff or those
treacherous leaves. We see what

we are getting into too late. Aching on one foot
then the other in the icy stream, we try to
wash the nasty oils from your freckled skin.

Three minor cases and you. Later,
those explanations at the drug store, the camp ground
the Laundromat. "It's not a terrible disease,"

you say with your palms turned up, "It's poison ivy."
You toughed it out. Behind you now, you're still not
laughing. You weren't laughing then either.