Soybean fields like rust
creep beneath the mist.
Brown gnats swirl around –
dust motes in a dusty land.
Patternless chickens
scatter in all directions.
In aggregate the cows meander,
churning slow as the deep river.
The man sees straight lines in his shingles.
He nails fence rails to more fence rails,
building northward until dark.
Stars emerge then, and trace their arc
across the sky, reliable
as the Maker’s word, inviolable.
B Taylor, 2015