Horses

I was standing 

In the dim barn, watching as

The swallows swooped,

Diving under old rafters

And stirring up near-dusk.

From that

Frame I gazed out into the paddock

Boasting stands of

Queen Anne's Lace, old

Stumps persisting

With growing green shoots,

While beyond, in the pasture,

Sarah traded fly masks 

For hackamores, hitching 

Long leads to bring 

Compliant horses to

Graze in grass near the 

Spot where we were viewing 

The pinking sky, mammatus 

Forming and then dissipating

Into the soft dusk of 

Seneca's miraculous hills.

The horses would have none 

Of our sentimental scenario,

Balking at the paddock's threshold

Into the barn,

And thence into the night's

Oncoming recap of a sun-struck day.

Still, her slim communing,

Her own golden mane in

The picture as I watched 

Was more perfect than what

She envisioned:

The swallows swooping,

This daughter and her tawny 

Horses, seen through 

Queen Anne's Lace, 

Tinged by closing gold, 

Unconscious 

Of her pure perfection in my

Moment.