for Gavin
Winter’s left shambled the break up rail fence. Notched stobs, years sunk
within the tallow shank of Linville Creek— distraught with runoff, although little snow—
lastly rotted March and April. The silver elm’s crashed limbs
snapped a dozen cross-beams whip-tailed in blackberry
and the jagged multiflora— punk pink roses I have a tendency to like.
I bush-axe, mattock thorny cane and catbrier,
clip, hack. In a fetch of sunshine, cupped in a fallen wren’s nest—
as if to overwinter within the pocket of an aged catcher’s mitt—
lay the misplaced baseball—teethed-upon, bluish-scarlet seams unraveled—
that little Gavin looped over my head three summers in the past as I pitched to him within the yard.
He and I searched by means of moonrise— The place can or not it’s? implored.
How he cherished that ball. It ought to have been there;
and, in fact, had been right here. Balls vanish, then reappear.
