Too Close to the 240

silence is gently nudged west
in her night-blindness and heavy drag;
and i feel like this day
is verging on busy

except that we are running on country-time
and any appointment
can be broken 
by the man-handled birth of a slickwet foal 
or an edge-of-seat overtime goal
(Goddammit, where is Marcel? He's gotta see this!)
or a front-door sick-day delivery;
homemade bowl of ham and pea soup
wrapped in a threadbare tea towel

gone are the gas-pedalled ground carvings;
dried up field doughnut ridges
burned in by spinning drunken wheels
(Grad 1995! 1997! 1998!)
the rain has been heavy this year, 
and has smoothed her scars.

we are afloat
in an all-seeing silence.

the meditative hum
of a harvester in a field
cradles
my sun-bleached sagging hay bale island
pooled in an ocean-view
of blue flax waves.

this open-sky expanse
slowly pushes all of the molecules
of my being into the right order.
 
since this town runs on the weather,
the farmers, like the sunflowers,
tilt their heads to the sky,
and relish the wholesome itch
of barley on their calves.
their chest-humming is lost
in the breeze.

this peace is a wind-quiet pulse
it's a makeshift night-baseball game in socks
in our overgrown yard
when the soft thud of an oven mitt catcher’s glove
becomes the heartbeat of the setting sun
 
and i know
that when you’re an eleven year old
and you have a banana seat that fits two
you wobblepedal to the closest ditch
throw down your ride
and find a place, deep down
tunnelled between tall wet grasses
to share secrets that disappear in the wind

so if i ever stand
too close to the 240
neck deep in cattails
 
please know
that i am not thumbing rides 
to heart-thud clubs and traffic lights
or even the vinyl-seated comforts of 
the next gas station
one town over

i am only holding still
long enough to become a tuning fork
so that this chorus of pond frogs
and crickets and grasshoppers
don't lose their pitch

i am only paused
remembering
that the wide expanse
of this dusty empty-full
can't be broken.

i am deep-breath-trusting
that the only thing that could
cut through any softvoice
made reverberating angelic 
in an empty metal granary

is a single blind leap into a freezing dugout
bringing up a scream that can split the sky