N.W. Hicks
Vacant Land
For sale: the broken ending
of a rock wall, rotten leaves, an outcrop
covered in lichen and moss,
seven cedar trees, two oaks, and three red maples
on one half-acre of New England swamp
at the toe of a clearcut hill.
Will build to suit:
never mind the birds returning
to the trees; or the bulbs of skunk cabbage –
all of that purple before a green bloom;
or the jewelweed holding on
to orange secrets for hummingbirds,
for summer; or all of the deep puddles,
between the sedges and rushes, reflecting grey sky,
singing with small peepers inflated like balloons.
Bio
N.W. Hicks is a Connecticut-based poet, a graduate of UConn, and earned his MA from Manhattanville. His poems have appeared in The Passionfruit Review, Molecule, Yes, Poetry, and elsewhere. He believes in water but works with dirt and dreams of becoming a river's meander.