WHY THE GROUNDHOG FEARS HIS SHADOW
Ava Leavell Haymon

Some men die and the sun
pops up the next morning,
rolls up the sky
in the old way, hails the clover
into blossom, puffs yellow moths
to giddy confusion.
Snow fell for a week
when my father died.

His grandchildren
had never seen snow before.
They were no longer grandchildren.
They slid down unfamiliar hills
on cardboard, day and night,
refused to come in to get warm.
Their first snowman
fossil-eyed, gouge-mouthed
would never melt.

ISBN 1-882983-14-9
27 pages/$6