o calm sheep in the fields asleep

be quiet while my husband sleeps

ride bicycles or drive your jeeps

in pastures where the snow is deep

the roads that bend o pay no heed

nor wonder where the neighbor speeds

nor ponder at the road’s sad fork

just plow on forward brave and dark

like Dante in his mid-life’s wood,

a sheep’s mid-life is stout and good

like beer that ambers from a tap

or maple running wine tree sap

you sheep of silence play along

in dreams my husband sleeps among

among the days of pastures deep

where Vikings, crop mice, village keep

the history of the wide white world

is where I’d like to live unfurled

inside a yurt on clovered cliffs

with three cats, one man, and a squirrel,

a squirrel you say, so odd and gay

a squirrel I say to make the day

all filled with furriness of tale

like Malory without his bail

who labored over Arthur’s death

while he himself in prison depths

molester of the nuns and cows,

my gentle husband, he’s not thou.