Courting Quiet on a Sunday Afternoon in Early Winter (Poetry #3)

Courting Quiet on a Sunday Afternoon in Early Winter

by Joseph Salvatore Knipper

Hush, it is not now my turn to speak.

Quiet claims the crevices between the leaves

and surveys each still-solidifying dimple of soil.

Woolly-bear and witch-hazel seed, granite grains and green beetle grub

submit to Her scepter. Hush, it is not now my turn to speak,

But to bind my brain under the brown mantle,

And follow, praying, two pace behind

Hoping for a kiss to fill my lungs with hoarfrost.