POEM
Prairie Houses
Unreasonable lenses refract the
sensitive rabbit holes, mole dwellings and snake
climes where twist burrow and sneeze
a native species
into houses
corresponding to hemispheric requests
of flatness
euphemistically, sentimentally
termed prairie.
On the earth exerting a willful pressure
something like a stethoscope against the breast
only permanent.
Selective engineering architectural submissiveness
and rendering of necessity in regard to height,
eschewment of climate exposure, elemental understandings,
constructive adjustments to vale and storm
historical reconstruction of early earthworks
and admiration
for later even oriental modelling
for a glimpse of baronial burdening
we see it in the rafters and the staircase heaviness
a surprise yet acting as ballast surely
the heavens strike hard on prairies.
Regard its hard-mouthed houses with their
robust nipples the gossamer hair.
Barbara Guest, “Prairie Houses” from Selected Poems (Los Angeles: Sun & Moon Press, 1995). Reprinted with the permission of the author.
Source: Selected Poems (1995)
