Cornfields

“And a field mouse was born in a field of corn.”

Corn in high summer
Tall as a man 
Near as tall as me
I admire the growing greensward
Yellow swords of ripe corn

Behind me now - or so I think 
More fields unfold before me
Uncanny kingdoms demarcated
By sleeping giants of implacable kudzu 

Miles and miles of corn in imminent reap
Hypnotic in their vast indifference 
I could lose myself among them

I could kick off all the constructs 
That cause my hesitation
Like a pair of too snug shoes 
And go barefoot
into the corn 

Would they shield me in their silence?
Would it stifle and make softer
The blow of every passing second 
That frantic hammer on my heart?

I wonder.

Maybe if I were brave enough 
To stop my car 
In its return from errands so mundane as to be troubling 
And get out

Leaving tethers of phone and key and fear behind
And walk 
Into the corn 
So deeply
That I could no longer hear the vicious road 

I could feel what it might be like 
To be a stalk of corn 

To have a family so innumerable and steadfast 
 that I am ignorant of loneliness 
To be rooted and united 
in one absolute and singular goal 
To grow 
To fruit and flower
To deliver bounty and ask for nothing in return 

Except sunlight
And water 
And space 

Between the kudzu guardians 

Illustrations by Felicia Bond from Margaret Wise Brown’s Big Red Barn