Forrest and the Beanstalk, Part I
Mama always said that cow was so dry
she only gave powdered milk.
It turns out I don’t know beans
about beans. The ones I traded for her
must have been Mexican jumping legumes
the way they bounced from Mama’s hand.
She picked up a carving knife, saying
something about us having to eat our shadows.
It made my stomach rumble,
so much the house began to shake
like a kid trying to get the last coin
from a piggy bank.
Outside the window, the night was green.
Them beans had grown
into a tower, five jenny’s wide,
and too big to hug behind the woodshed.
I thought the stalk might even pierce the moon.
I guess it was one of those Babel Towers
from the Bible, as Mama started clucking,
and peckin’ her head at it like a fat hen.
As she kept waving that knife, it seemed
good to me to see what was up top.
Would you have guessed there’d be a castle
on the other side of the clouds? Me neither.
Mama always said that cow was so dry
she only gave powdered milk.
It turns out I don’t know beans
about beans. The ones I traded for her
must have been Mexican jumping legumes
the way they bounced from Mama’s hand.
She picked up a carving knife, saying
something about us having to eat our shadows.
It made my stomach rumble,
so much the house began to shake
like a kid trying to get the last coin
from a piggy bank.
Outside the window, the night was green.
Them beans had grown
into a tower, five jenny’s wide,
and too big to hug behind the woodshed.
I thought the stalk might even pierce the moon.
I guess it was one of those Babel Towers
from the Bible, as Mama started clucking,
and peckin’ her head at it like a fat hen.
As she kept waving that knife, it seemed
good to me to see what was up top.
Would you have guessed there’d be a castle
on the other side of the clouds? Me neither.
The secret of poetry is cruelty.--Jon Anderson