Ballard Page 2

the grit of my search settling with the
     undisturbed
heavier stones, or maybe shoveled
off like helicopter seed where the chaos
of the day retrieves itself. Maybe the torn
edges of my own shadow snaggered by locust
     thorns,
leaves of thought hiding from rituals of gain and
     loss.

And the next stranger's trespass will make no
sense of my confusion of footprints. The crisp
nettles vibrating in the breeze will have
disguised my voice; the thatch-work already
sprung back to the memory of itself (the trees
still leaning, though, as if they still see me).



Barry Ballard's most recent poetry collection is A Body Speaks Through Fence Lines, published by Pudding House in 2006.