Not Another Poem About Vermont

by Jim Esch

amid snow heaps of past participles,
phrases shorn like strips of maple bark,
piled like lumber, so much split wood,
words, who needs them like this?
show me how to swing an axe and chop
with economy of motion so I don't bleed
or amputate something I need
show me something more than I might order
from LL Bean or grasp as photographic souvenir.
the worlds depicted in woven lines are
unrecognizable to eyes accustomed to crabgrass
punching through the cracks and upheaved paver stones
the potholes, curbs, bent street signs,
the heart rattling hollow, sitting in the car
waiting for a light to turn, nodding at a stop sign
as some intersecting someone with finger flash
waves me through this sad barrier of a day,
so distant from warbling birds in golden Vermont trees.