The Villagers

LEWIS TURCO

THE VILLAGERS

The mill grinds the night

into dark flours which the river wind

blows among the trees along its bank

like pumice or mist. A coon

or some other animal stirs darkness

into leaves and underbrush

as it burrows along the mill wall.

The stream, cascading down from its pitch

and fall, turns the night sounds

like a great wheel, drowns the moon

in turbulence. It rises there, the building,

between those pine tips which spear midnight

in the gulley-rises and disappears

and reappears as the villagers,

in mufflers and shawls, come in a long line

for sacks of umbra to make their bread.

The line wavers along the streambed down

almost to the river. Their hands,

extended out of filigree and frost,

accept the starlight. They turn to walk

back to town and home,

for they have shadow now to sustain shadow.

And as the wind comes up it shall blow them to bed-

shall blow the mill itself into mist, all

but the great stone

which shall roll into the lichen and fern

along the stream and be still until tomorrow.