Renegade

Renegade


In a rush of blackberry bramble,
a noisy burr laps at light and swallows
whole; I am born, a changeling,
and the world becomes me.


Plump and moist with clever skin,
determined and bright as Sunday sky,
I roll about my mother’s carpet leaving
a rangy trail of baby mischief..


Impetuous and bold, a jumble hoarder,
I am weed, in her woolen garden.
Though in season I turn a flower face,
in shadow, still, tangled edges

stir, a lurid dance that startles wind,
as my progeny usurp the frightened hills,
reeling in their wild, unruly grace.
Oh God, can you forgive this randoming,

this vagabond of soul, the insatiate thirst
for forbidden ground, my infidelity to
wall and patch and row, holding fast with
suckered hands, this place of light and soil

that others, in their wisdom, deem
unsuitable to grow?
What purpose has this conduct,
impervious
to blight , that jumps the woolen fringe
spewing seed into the night?


@jms 30aug86