Used for jelly and wine,
wild cherry syrup for coughs
from the bark, the wood
red-brown with whitish
sapwood, resistant
to decay, durable,
the small cherries are called drupes,
leave yellowed stones.
Found in oak hickory woods,
not here. I would re-arrange
the world this morning, bring
the trees walking towards me
like Orpheus or MacBeth.
Instead the words of those saw-toothed
leaves float down about me,
and a forest of silent sound swallows
the light of here and now.
About Carol Hamilton
Carol Hamilton has recent publications In Louisiana Review, Tribeca Poetry Review, Boston Literary Review, Iodine Poetry Review, Bluestem, I-70 Review, U.S.1 Worksheet, Colere, Lilliput, Flint Hills Review, Hubbub, Blue Unicorn, Sow's Ear Poetry, District Lit, Haight Ashbury Poetry Journal, Texas Poetry Calendar and others. She has published 17 books: children's novels, legends and poetry, the latest being Such Deaths. She is a former poet laureate of Oklahoma and has been nominated five times for a Pushcart Prize.
