When I’m Ready To Go
take me to the greensward, the woodland dale
beyond the tangle of supple willow spurs
where a footbridge crosses the river
that mirrors a few bleached-yarn clouds.
Tag along to where tiny purple-white
pagodas crop up among late spring grasses.
Let me get deliriously lost in a secret ravine
where fiesta flowers cling to my legs
so I can gather wood mint for tea,
let the hairy fringe pod keep its secrets.
I want to tread trails deer forge through
underbrush that crowds the oak forest
and talk with the fractured scarecrow
husk of an old pine stump.
Allow me time to linger beside owl’s clover
and lime-green tresses of maidenhair fern,
admire saffron sun-kissed lichen on a fallen log,
follow a wandering cabbage white butterfly.
Then leave me where the buckeye branches
circulate their vanilla scent in May and
cast off chestnut-colored spheres in fall
onto the backyard fringe of a sunlit meadow.
Laura Bayless lives in Carmel Valley, is the author of four collections of poetry. Her poems have appeared in many local and national publications. She has participated in seven Women’s Voices readings at the Carl Cherry Center in Carmel and multiple Women and Food poetry presentations on the Monterey Peninsula. She is an Associate Editor of the Monterey Poetry Review.
take me to the greensward, the woodland dale
beyond the tangle of supple willow spurs
where a footbridge crosses the river
that mirrors a few bleached-yarn clouds.
Tag along to where tiny purple-white
pagodas crop up among late spring grasses.
Let me get deliriously lost in a secret ravine
where fiesta flowers cling to my legs
so I can gather wood mint for tea,
let the hairy fringe pod keep its secrets.
I want to tread trails deer forge through
underbrush that crowds the oak forest
and talk with the fractured scarecrow
husk of an old pine stump.
Allow me time to linger beside owl’s clover
and lime-green tresses of maidenhair fern,
admire saffron sun-kissed lichen on a fallen log,
follow a wandering cabbage white butterfly.
Then leave me where the buckeye branches
circulate their vanilla scent in May and
cast off chestnut-colored spheres in fall
onto the backyard fringe of a sunlit meadow.
Laura Bayless lives in Carmel Valley, is the author of four collections of poetry. Her poems have appeared in many local and national publications. She has participated in seven Women’s Voices readings at the Carl Cherry Center in Carmel and multiple Women and Food poetry presentations on the Monterey Peninsula. She is an Associate Editor of the Monterey Poetry Review.
