Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, NORTHERN MICHIGAN, by JAMES HARRISON


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

NORTHERN MICHIGAN, by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: On this back road the land
Last Line: Through the woods.
Alternate Author Name(s): Harrison, Jim
Subject(s): Country Life; Decay; Landscape; Michigan; Nature; Rot; Decadence


On this back road the land
has the juice taken out of it:

stump fences surround nothing
worth their tearing down

by a deserted filling station
a Veedol sign, the rusted hulk

of a Frazer, "live bait"
on battered tin.

A barn
with half a tobacco ad
owns the greenness of a manure
pile

a half-moon on a privy door
a rope swinging from an elm. A

collapsed henhouse, a pump
with the handle up

the orchard with wild tangled branches.

̺ ̺ ̺

In the far corner of the pasture,
in the shadow of the woodlot
a herd of twenty deer:
three bucks

are showing off -
they jump in turn across the fence,
flanks arch and twist to get higher
in the twilight
as the last light filters
through the woods.





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