Least Read Poems About the Countryside

Bugs are attracted
to the awashed-orleander pages, a flower
with textual landing strips. Words  
  
flutter resembling a sea under hazy skies  
of grass scribbled, a proclamation  
of make me more. Pollinate  
   
these thoughtwords and brush them off before  

the crush of paper’s weight- them being bugs,
  
the page isn’t for the owl but for these  
   
who pass it on it on; this it  
is a continuity when she feeds. She scrambles  
what came before bottled within another  
   
and...

Down in the bayou, where the moss hangs low
And the gators lie quiet in the water’s slow flow
The law come sniffin’ with their collars tight
But they don’t belong in the swamp at night

With lanterns high and their boots so clean
Cut through the cane where the ghosts ain't seen
But the folks here know where the shadows creep
And the secrets kept in the waters deep

The bayou don’t care for a badge or a name
And it don’t bow down to a city man’s claim
So they come with their guns and their silver stars
But the swamp don’t reckon...

Rustling whispers haunt the night
Paths where lights reach never could
The branches shiver, void of light
A spectral hymn in the darkened wood

The ranches lock their shutters
To bar the beast from crossing in
Presence chills marked by foul mutters
A herald of despair and sin

The cattle wail in trembling fear
The barn’s old beams creak low and long
The wind, like death, cuts sharp and clear
A dirge sung, its demented song

What treads upon yon fields of clover?  
Its claws carve tales in bark and stone
The...