These are two poems I wrote for my creative writing class. We had to take seven of the poems in our collection, and imitate them, seeing where we could go with it...

(imitation of Twilight: After Haying by Jane Kenyon)

“Summer Storm: After Planting”

Yes, the sun falls over

the sky’s arch; and yes, today

must give way to tomorrow;

what else could it do?

We sit and stare at the garden,

too tired to go back inside.

We sip our ginger beer,

legs dangling from the back of the pickup,

our hair like honey warm

with the sun. (It fades.

The clouds roll in

and cool the blood in our veins.)

The storm comes

to kiss our work,

and our tired hands—

sow and reap, reap and sow

—echoes from the near corner of the sky.

These things happen…the success of our work

and the struggle turn one upon another,

like the rotatiller through the earth…

The last, lukewarm sip

of carbonation and ginger

goes down with the coming of the rain;

the impregnated field

drinks deep of the water.

-----------

(imitation of "To Jesus on Easter" by Vassar Miller)

"To Jesus on Holy Saturday"

You spend the night saving the lost,

the waters of death parting

like the dark before a shooting star.

It resists you no more than a stone the pull of gravity,

as you crash into its world.

Everyone thought it was the end. But you are only beginning.

Not that I can see You, who are nearer

than all my thoughts about you,

and dearer. They pale before you like stars in the sunlight.

But I need You. You resembling me--

two eyes, two hands, two feet,

a human heart--will capture my being,

falling toward loneliness, seized by your wounds.

And when the last sun fails to rise

I shall wake to find you in the garden with my name on your lips.