The Lyric Moment
Because the ground is wet still
and the moon small,
and because the wildfire smoke
tells of summer, we place our shoes
on the ground before stepping
into the grass and remember
a friend telling his students
that the lyric moment must
be created among them if they are
to understand Rilke.
Again and again,
however we know the landscape of love,
the deep scent of night, earth coating
the lines of our heels, the skin
calloused, the darkness a thing
to be touched, the heart beginning
to sing in a language we wait
to be taught, we wait, we wait.
Graham Hillard holds an MFA in Creative Writing from New York University. He lives in Nashville, TN, where he teaches Creative Writing at Trevecca Nazarene University. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in Dirt, Skyline Review, Tar River Poetry, and New York Quarterly.