Not that the scenery is grandiose
or that the view is mountainous or panoramic,
but there’s a lazy fence of muscadines
where scaling vines have latched onto
what’s left on a wayward oak– I am inspired.

A canopy of dangling grapes
covers my thoughts.
I sit and nibble like a goat
and reassure myself I have a need
to wonder randomly, an itch ,
itch to swing from my back porch
while the feet are reaching heaven.
I have an urge to stray like a lonely tern without direction–

and here in the awe of afternoon,
I bend like a sea-bored willow would
and become preoccupied with all that quickens
while the agony of circumstance
curls into the shape of an “S” and worms its way
into the earth for alleviation.

I am merely bent as any willow,
not broken as a bell.