shirtless shoeless early
June to everything
it’s season for how many
years have i done this?
we heathens, too, have
ritual without religion

chicken sqwak in mid egg lay
sharp shin hawk on the spruce
smudge and toke,
i pray

last night burned
as it settled
with dry logs on top
still this morning smolders
ash, i add it in handfuls

a dream ferments like kraut
flutters like a cabbage moth
lets wolf spiders crawl
without a flinch

first part
the wood chips
with bare feet
a stride between
each pair of seeds

each wrinkled
duet dropped
two knuckles deep
into a finger poke

sow in one spiral row
from bed center
lengthening

like a line of nazca
i have never seen

there will be watering
and weeding
but god willing

before summer’s done
i’ll grow a snail shell
of corn