Hayden Carruth (1921-2008)

Honey    I’d split your kindling

    clean & bright

& fine

    if you was mine

baby baby

    I’d taken to you like my silky hen

my bluetick bitch my sooey sow

    my chipmunk    my finchbird

& my woodmouse

    if you was living at my house

I’d mulch your strawberries & cultivate

    your potato patch

all summer long

    & then in winter

come thirty below and the steel-busting weather

    I’d tune your distributor & adjust

your carburetor

    if me & you was together

be it sunshine be it gloom

    summer or the mean mud season

honey I’d kiss you

    every morningtime

& evenings I’d hurry

    to get shut of the barn chores early

& then in the dark of the night

    I’d stand at the top of the stairs & hold the light

for you for you

    if you’d sleep in my room

& when old crazy come down the mountain after you

    with his big white pecker in his hand

you would only holler

    & from the sugar house

the mow    the stable

    or wherever I’m at

I’d come    god I’d come running to you

    like a turpentined cat

only in our bed

    honey

no hurting

    but like as if it was

git- music

    or new-baked bread

I’d fuck so easy

    sweet-talking & full of love

if you was just my daisy

    & my dove

* * *

English Department professor Meredith Martin writes: