We go to the farm near nightfall
(hardly a farm at all now
hemmed in as it is by houses
of equal shape and color)
though the walls are white as a temple still
and the work of the old clapboards holds
and there’s a red barn
sagging under the weight of history
like a father’s heart about to burst.
The game is name and point
as I show him the animals for the first time
and he repeats them syllable by syllable
with little thuds
in this paradise already fallen
like a ripe apple in the grass
its time come.
Peering into bovine eyes
that glow like wild honey
in the twilight
he says after me “cow,”
his awe so original he dares to touch
the enormous wet nose
though only for the briefest second,
his tiny arm recoiling
like a serpent after striking.
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