Field Guide to Stillness

Charlotte Matthews

There is a steep hill and clover
thick as lamb’s ear, as leather bellows
splayed to rouse fire embers.
And there is a boy lying motionless
at the hill’s crest waiting
for the right moment to roll
unencumbered to the meadow
which parallels the creek.

In his mind the knowing
of what it is to fly.

In his mind such longing.
Nightfall. Daybreak.

But this particular boy
will let himself go
so he can rest
near the water-invisible
smell of sassafras close
in the air, so he can think
of the imaginary bridge
he keeps on drawing,
of his picture of the wind.

CURRENT ISSUE
PAST ISSUES
SUBMISSIONS
CONTEST
ABOUT THE GR

ABOUT THE AUTHOR.

CHARLOTTE MATTHEWS is author of a full-length collection of poems, Green Stars (Iris Publishing Group). Her work has recently appeared in such magazines at The Virginia Quarterly Review, Borderlands, Tar River Poetry, and Potomac Review. She is an associate professor of English at the University of Virginia.