CREEK ROAD by CLARK B. FIRESTONE

She might be gracing a corn-shuck feast,
An apple-peeling; not in the least
Does that interest her. By a creek she dwells,
And down the creek is the sound of bells
Where cattle pass to the county town.

Everything else goes down the road:
From the clinging porch of her log abode
She sees the world of the hills go by,
Riding, riding, from far or nigh
Men on horses and men on mules

The while she churns. There are farmer folk,
And drovers, and men with the peddler's poke,
And roving preachers from scope and glen,
And raw fur buyers, and sheriff's men.
She looks at them and then at the hills

Where hen-hawks scream, and the hieroglyph
Of naked cedars edges the cliff.
Below it are ferny coves, and corn
Slants dizzily down, and the fields are shorn
Of their timothy by the questing kine.

Beside the creek are a barn and shed,
A sorghum patch and a ginseng bed;
On the porch wall is a ground hog's hide;
A wood fire burns on the hearth inside,
A bean pot bubbles upon the crane --

A narrow stage. Yet the creek has a song,
And men go riding its course along,
And mules and horses, plashing the stream,
Attune the song to the young girl's dream.
Her lips are parted, her gray eyes shine.

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