Kate
Nancy L’enz Hogan
The walking trip across the moors
gave some small rewards,
mostly the bell-shaped pinkish heather,
plus the usual mystery flora -
’See - “ one of the girl hikers said,
flicking a finger at a rabbit,
“a fauna!”
Mare’s tails trailed across the
gay blue sky (then a good word still was “gay”)
Somewhere on the ground grouse drummed
and high in the distance a Lilliputian biplane
coughed and hung there in the air
“Hooray - look - it’s a road! Let’s find a
drugstore - I guess I mean a chemist, don’t I?
They must have gause for blisters there!”
Oh, shops! The girls bumped each other into the
chemist’s door, pushing and laughing
“Hey, aren’t you coming in, Kate?” -
affectionately, carelessly off-hand -
Good ol’ Kate, hanging back, petting dogs,
whistling along with birds
She stood there waiting in the multi-scented air...
smiled, waved once at her friends inside
Her thick auburn hair glinted
in the leaf-filtered light
It seemed to reflect the flash of brass
on the gear of the horse
just topping the rise
in the road
where Kate waited
A man was reining the snorting horse
from the seat of a Gypsy wagon
The man’s dark eyes and Kate’s green gaze
met and melded and held
Lights flickered in his eyes
like torches in a storm
Her breath was quelled
and she was not surprised
to feel it stolen by the Gypsy’s eyes
He motioned to the empty space
beside him on the wagon seat
When her friends emerged
from the chemist shop
they looked for Kate and called
all looked and called and looked
for their lost Kate...
but all were far too late;
she had found
the open gate
