Laynie Browne

"A Mullein Sceptre in My Hand"  

        for Willa Cather


The dream, a thousand dreams 
old ports of white foam: what is to be 
Go to sell a saucepan

Volcanic cradle

In a city full of brief inscription 
quickening broken houses

a new sail full of exiles


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The first possessor 
worn down mother-language 
a sole gracious object

A silver cup, rags and rusty kettles 
Rain-marks behind a clock tower

Oarsman, a damp hole filled with loops and flourishes

Gutter pallid 
a chalk flicker


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Haze mauls faint-blue 
claws in noose country 

A sturdy bunch of prairie 
stretched across a bed


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Lambent, 
read stars

hereafter

perils 
rolling 
red

Prophecy, a leader of kin

A caravan of 
undulations



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A dent of heaven 
could not impart 
a tied wheel

"Stricken, she left familiar earth behind her"

A hailed blue lake 
skirmishes where the railroad ends

Native silence 
a slow moving sweep of discretion

Toiling larks 
star, its fierce necessity

Out dusk, the lips of larks 
Out earth, tired fires of sunset


+


To mandolin, 
a water ditch

A moon-enchanted plain 
had swung 

Would our shade could drink 
the blue night

Hush my kitchen 
on the black pond water


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Doorstep, in her arms 
an owl slept

Windmill modder cry 
a drifting herd

an' road so steep 
rasped the tale again

Bring home sheep

Entrammelled gambler 
sorrow marble diurnal


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Murmur of old stone 
yellow water

Cross no mill

arms of darkness

No matter which primrose 
rondel

Poppies doorways 
browse


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Yearneth 
violet blows

turf comeliest 
on a higher hill, ransom

Dogwoods starry 
fell in flocks

Crooned bower 
Canst thou conjure?


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Bid longings 
a winter wood

Covet long ages fled 
a torch of pale vigil

Crimson hour 
a crown

Beheld 
a pearl 
merchant 
taunting


+


cloud Cleopatra 
go a-Maying

six lips singing

fray of short lived weather

Wrought of dust 
true asleep

The moonset 
a stone house