Rebecca T. Dickinson
get up some
mornings
when the fog
covers the
grass knee high,
still uncut. it
blankets the hill
and shrouds the
mountain in the
near distance.
other dawns spill
the colors of sunflowers
and tiger lily blossoms
across the fields and
above the mountain.
the colors spread across
the sky like a harvest time
illustration of a
cornucopia
when the food overflows.
Some mornings on the
farm, I stretch and see
the fog
the rain
the sun
out the window, and
remember instantly
you’re gone.
i feel like
a cow
that never
jumped.
it chews
and
chews
it rips
grass
from the
ground.
If endless pits
of black
could be felt,
it is the space
inside my
chest and
the sun
long ago
went down.
The flashlight
batteries died.
The levels of
darkness with
gnashing teeth
and monster
growls echo
as i look out
at the field
behind our
house in
the morning,
and try to
figure out
what I
really feel.
get up some
mornings
after a bird
lands in
the field
where the
farmer has yet
to run
his tractor and
extract the grass
from the ground
for his cows’
winter hay.
the mornings
when the
sun makes
the field
behind the
house look
like the color
of wheat, i
search my
endless pit
for a reason
to walk,
to work,
to call your
puppy’s name
on the farm.
I hear you
from a
distant
space say,
“Mommy,
what about
my brother?”
Then
I
get
up.
Rebecca T. Dickinson
Rebecca T. Dickinson is an author of twenty creative works, including poetry, short stories, memoir, and academic work. She’s also a LEGO Master Educator of middle school English in South Carolina. “The Drive to the Thrift Store'' in Coneflower Review by Choefplerin Press, “Six” in The Deronda Review, “Jeriah” and “No Words for Sinners” in vol. 120 of Radical Teacher, and “If I Call You Juliet” in The Walled City Journal (Pakistan) are among twenty pieces of published work by Dickinson. She lives in Kings Mountain, North Carolina raising her son with autism, helps her husband who recently battled cancer, and remembers her five-and-a-half-year-old daughter, Corrie, who died suddenly on May 27, 2020. Find her on Twitter @Corries_Corner_ and blog at seasonofcorrie.wordpress.com.