The soft white of a moonlit night
gently washes these rolling scenes
of northeast Kansas in late August.

Heavy drops glisten on the glass
as I walk past the front of the car,
seams of light reflecting in the beads.

Long silhouettes of limber locust branches
droop toward earth in fine-leaved weave
of slender forms patterned on the grass.

Between the garage and the ridge beyond the creek,
low slopes of pasture meet the steep bank
that cuts down to the road.

A nearly full moon shimmers on curving waves of fescue,
long blades bowed beneath the soaking dew,
dunes of light patterned by subtle shadows.

A half-mile away, the full forms of heavy trees
border the northern edge of an upland field,
where Angus sleep underneath their covering sheath.

Lone and stark on the long line of the hill,
a solitary pin oak stakes its shape against the light,
black branches angling toward earth.

Along the cutting turns of Peter’s Creek,
thin mist hangs above the bottomlands,
pressing ever so lightly against the stone bluffs,

Drifting across the narrow flats 
of winding rows of corn that stand twice the height of men,
heavy ears bending downward with the heaviness of harvest.

I stand beneath a silent heaven,
feeling the cool trace of chilled air
against the bareness of my shoulders,

knowing that not so much time now
hangs between this and colder mornings,
yielding to this peaceful forming that carries us toward

a greater dawning.


H. Arnett
8/30/2023