a cold wind flows over the cornfields…

bySusieGhahremani

The Call Away 
by Robert Bly

A cold wind flows over the cornfields;

Fleets of blackbirds ride that ocean.

I want to be out of here, go out,

My back against a shed wall, I settle


Down where no one can find me.


I stare out at the box-elder leaves

Moving frond-like in that mysterious water.

What is it that I want? Not money,

Not a large desk, not a house with ten rooms.


This is what I want to do: to sit here,

To take no part, to be called away by wind.

I want to go the new way, build a shack

With one door, sit against the door frame.

After twenty years, you will see on my face

The same expression you see in the grass.

Robert Bly, “The Call Away” from Like the New Moon, I Will Live My Life. Copyright 2015 by Robert Bly. Used by permission of The Permissions Company, LLC on behalf of White Pine Press, whitepine.org.

Leave a comment