AUGURIES
The crow caws on the roof’s west horn
of the Maranatha Free Will Baptist church,
feeds the prophet a late breakfast.
Geese fly in a westward V.
Green-gilled mushrooms track fairy dances on the lawn.
On the creek bank of a Sunday
the Baptists were in full cry.
The gassy governor of chaos looks down red-eyed.
The hunter rises, calls his white dog, perhaps once red:
the master comes,
the bleeding woman clings to his skirt,
his power flows.
The Moon scuds in her last quarter
washed of the red eclipse, of the ninth day’s shame.
7 AM, August 22nd 1989 / 21 Av 5749, Ardmore, Oklahoma