Abandoned Shacks in North Carolina

Tucked beside the freeway, behind wings

of barbed wire and stockless fields,

they shoulder into dusk and fade.

Spigots frozen. Stone-hard hills.

Sometimes, I want to disappear

that simply—growing into dim pastures

with deer ticks and snakeskins,

wing beats above.

I want to be filled with wind

and winter’s slow thaw, a hibernating light.

Collapsing inside themselves

they’re almost beautiful, glittering

like forgotten temples out in the snow,

crossbeams broken, doors unlatched.

Like a bright hoof, the moon

stamps down through their missing slats

and at last the night surrounds.

Every star is sown; every field is blue.