July is a busy month in nature which means it is a busy month on the farm – the two intertwined and inextricably linked. In garden and orchard, the farmers till, weed, plant, and cull; while all around them, in woods and wetland, grass and sky, the non-human habitants carry on with urgent summer labors of their own.

—Terry House, Poetry Editor

Turning Light

by Mary Pinard

What kind of underworld

weaving could they be working on

so busily? These ten gangly-necked

goslings, mottled shuttles plying

a zigzag wake in the reedy pond

as their sleek heads turn and angle,

then dip - here, there – appearing

to disappear through slits in the watery

surface, yet just as quickly they are

back up from some distant loom,

their bills draped with the thinnest

green strands that glisten, splash –

like tiny diamond stitches made

and unmade in this turning light.

Mary Pinard, a long-time plein air poetry contributor, is the author of two books of poetry: Portal (Salmon Press, 2014) and Ghost Heart (Ex Ophidia Press, 2022). She lives in Roslindale and teaches at Babson College.