by M. L. Smoker¹

    And to think I had just paid a cousin twenty dollars to shovel² the walk.

    He and two of his buddies³， still smelling of an all-nighter，

    arrived at 7 am to begin their work.

    When I left them a while later I noticed their ungloved hands

    and winter made me feel selfish and unsure.

    This ground seems unsure of itself

    for its own reasons.

    Real spring is still distant

    and no one is trying to make themselves believe

    this might last， this last unreasonable⁴ half hour.

    It is six-thirty in eastern Montana and the cold

    has finally given way.

    The time is important not because this has been a long winter

    or for the fact that it is my first here

    since childhood， but because there is so much else

    to be unsure of.

    At a time like this

    how is it that when I left only a week ago

    there were three feet of snow on the ground，

    and now there are none， not even a single patch

    holding on in the shadow of the fence-line.

    We do not gauge⁵ enough of our lives

    by changes in temperature.

    When I first began to write poems I was laying claim to battle.

    It began with a death and I have tried to say it was unjust，

    not because of the actual dying but because of what

    was left.  What time of year was that？

    I have still not yet learned to write of war.

    I have friends who speak out——as is necessary——with subtle

    and unsubtle force. But I am from

    this place and a great deal has been going wrong

    for some time now.

    The two young Indian boys who might have drowned

    last night in the fast-rising creek⁶ near school

    are casualties enough for me.

    There have been too many

    just like them and I have no way to fix these things.

    A friend from Boston wrote something to me last week

    about not have the intelligence

    to take as subject for his poems

    anything other than his own life.

    For a while now I have sensed this in my own mood：

    this poem was never supposed to mention

    itself， other writers， or me.

    But I will not regret the boys who made it home，

    or the cousins who used the money at the bar.

    Still， something is being lost here and there are no lights

    on this street； enough mud remains⁷ on our feet

    to carry with us into the house.

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