WYNN LIBBY

The Gravel Pit

A Golden Shovel after Constance Hunting’s “New England”

They sell it as soil, once they sift the stones.
What has become gravel hides pools where the ducks are.
Only us people try to speak over cicadas. The
trees that were cut last year hid stone walls meant for sheep.
I didn't know until I read about it. Of
everything cleared from this land, that these
mounds of dirt hid sheep grazing the hillsides

baffles. History is more than the deeds of great men and
too many words on pages. It's tilling land in the fog,
churning loose rock to the surface. “Is
there anything else down there?” No answer. The
sleeping machines never wake, spiders spinning wool
in their cabins. Caught there is something of
me. Daydreams, maybe. For some reason it's days like these
I remember, our conversations sifted like so many stones.

Wynn is a writer from Maine, now living in Ontario with his wife. He is an author of unfinished work and a thinker of unfinished thoughts. You can find his words published or forthcoming in Queen's Quarterly, Pinhole Poetry, bywords.ca, and elsewhere. He also co-edits a magazine titled Hot Soup.