Old Scratch

It is night.
There is a sound outside.
I start up in bed and listen,
Limbs hinged by fire, not wanting to move.
A father’s death,
A mother's mad grief …

Over three thousand miles, fifteen years—
Fuchsias spill over pots,
Weeping cherry swaying.
The stone table sits—
Leaf-engraved benches
Where we ate breakfast.
The wisteria hangs, sullen, purple.

Smell of sulfur, beat of split hoof—
He is coming for me
As promised.
I welcome him with arms open.
How long I have waited!
Even now, in a secret life,
We dwell in that house together.

Irene Barnard

Irene Barnard recently finished San Francisco State University’s graduate writing program. She has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 1997 and received Honorable Mention in the Academy of American Poets' Harold Taylor Prize in 1999. She writes about humans, nature, and human nature, and has been published in Tempus, nocturne(s) review, Coast & Ocean, Under Duress and Bay Nature.