Visitation

The day’s almost gone by
and no one has arrived to say:

Here is where you touch the world
and here are the words to feel its heat.

Meanwhile, two horses wait
at the gate, stamping their feet.

By the side of the barn in plain sight
loops of barbed wire rust into dirt.

The old apple grows horizontally
across the stream, as if already a log.

Whatever it is I see in this late afternoon light
my mother longs for from her grave.

You are of the world, she says,
admonishing me.

Mermer Blakeslee