What A Boy Lies Awake Wondering<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Footsore trudging these fields
\nwhile overhead dip and wheel
\nunfolding lives on the wing
\nsome evenings every other living thing
\nseems dipped in desire glistening<\/p>\n
so I envy the horse that can ripple
\nits skin out from under the horsefly
\nand the thousand-eyed horsefly
\nthat bites me clean through
\nthe workshirt stuck to my shoulders<\/p>\n
I envy the hen so suspicious
\nof me she can turn her head backwards
\nand the slippery calf being nudged up
\nlicked clean of its birth
\nall set to dance at a touch<\/p>\n
and the water skeeter astride
\nthe silvery skin of the horse trough
\ninhaled by those whiskery muzzles
\nand the green snake so still in the lilac
\nwhose tongue neatly scissors the world<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
“What A Boy Lies Awake Wondering” is reprinted <\/p>\n Paul Hunter<\/a> has lent a hand where it was needed\u2014as teacher, performer, grassroots arts activist, worker on the land, and shade-tree mechanic. For the past 18 years he has published fine letterpress poetry under the imprint of Wood Works,<\/a> currently including 26 books and over 60 broadsides. His poems have appeared in Alaska Fisherman\u2019s Journal, Beloit Poetry Journal, Bloomsbury Review, Iowa Review, North American Review, Poetry, Poetry Northwest, Prairie Schooner, Raven Chronicles, The Small Farmer\u2019s Journal, The Southern Review<\/em> and Spoon River Poetry Review,<\/em> as well as in six full-length books and three chapbooks. His first collection of farming poems, Breaking Ground,<\/em> <\/a>2004, from Silverfish Review Press, was reviewed in the New York Times, and received the 2004 Washington State Book Award. A second volume of farming poems, Ripening,<\/a><\/em> was published in 2007, and a third companion volume, Come the Harvest,<\/em> <\/a>appeared in 2008. He has been a featured poet on The News Hour with Jim Lehrer. <\/a>His recent prose book, One Seed to Another: The New Small Farming,<\/em> <\/a>was published by the Small Farmer\u2019s Journal in 2010. A fourth collection of farming poems, Stubble Field,<\/em> <\/a>is due out from Silverfish Review Press, in May 2012.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" What A Boy Lies Awake Wondering Footsore trudging these fields while overhead dip and wheel unfolding lives on the wing some evenings every other living thing seems dipped in desire glistening so I envy the horse that can ripple … Continue reading
\nfrom Ripening,<\/em> (Silverfish Review Press, 2007).<\/p>\n