Scarecrow

Scarecrow on your wooden cross
vigil through each year
How absurd to think your grin
is one a crow would fear

Distinctive in your ragged clothes
Sundays, Mondays best
Does the farmer ever boast
how well his Scarecrows dressed

Like so many everyday
you fail to see the loss
Still so small a price to pay
when hunger is the cost

At a loss for words again
the time has come to yield
Midnight brings an appetite
that spreads across the field

Daybreak brings the farmers frown
and words you cannot hear
Words that say you’ve let him down
and won’t be here next year

Scarecrow have you lost your senses
just what would it take
To learn to share unconsciously
while we are awake

December 1995