The earth teemed
with jazzy knuckle-cracks
keeping time beneath
high boots and wild ginger
shoots too cool
to light, though
sweating dew…

The burn — too quick
to scorch soil — only
painted,
with oil begged
from every bluestem root,
onto a glossy veneer:

an uneven, inky iridescence;
a toad’s damp spine;

wet-shine, smoking
like a body in night-rain,
surprising my downstretched
fingertips with a chalky
black chill

licking nails
as silver
as a cold-sweat shiver.