Sunday Poem: David Edelman

The Yellow in a Field

for Julian

The yellow in a field of mustard waves
in the lingering breeze like a woman's dress,
cotton light and loose, the kind she craves
when the sun hits hard in sultry August.

The yellow of the dress is the woman's feel
as she waves in the breeze like a field
of mustard, bending limber as a peel
of lemon, the tang of her skirt unsealed.

Lifting in the breeze, the dress of the woman
yellows a land that is otherwise grey,
concrete and rubble turned scent of lemon,
the monotonies of weather broken like rain.

The mustard in the field is the woman in wind,
the yellow of her dress the love that bends.



David Edelman, After the Translation (Waldron Island, WA: Brooding Heron Press, 2001).
Copyright © 2001 David Edelman