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Donkeys also make good guard animals.
Sally Ashton
There may be 13 ways of looking at a blackbird, but that was before Heisenberg. I can't bear how his principle changes everything. When it comes to hearing a donkey, if her name is Juanita out of nowhere her voice swings, a gate that hasn't opened in years. To hear is luck, the best sort of luck. Dumb luck. A triumph, her absurd noise shoehorned into the morning's certain desperation. Jack hammers, blue jays, the bass line banging from the neighbor boy's garage band undisturbed. Garbage truck grumbles down the street. Mad, crazy day. It is enough, of an instant, Juanita's crass sound foregrounded bears some momentary miracle more believable than angels. It is enough, the frozen hinge loosened, the hasp giving way with a groan. Once opened some gates cannot remain shut. This is good in a strange way and strange in a good way.
But not 13 ways. Likely, more.
© 2006 Sally Ashton
Sally Ashton has a chapbook, These Metallic Days, from Main Street Rag. She is Editor in Chief of the DMQ Review and teaches poetry in California. where she is ready for the rain to let up. This poem is from her prose poem collection, Her Name is Juanita.
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