Vox Populi
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Dawn Potter: Arcadia, 1939
Horse cropping grass under birch trees, a canary-yellow tinker’s cart, rosy geraniums at the window, shelf lined with the novels of Dickens— warmth of bread baking, a cardinal alight in a branching oak, white bed, linens floating in air, a table laid in an arbor’s shade— ironed napkins, bright forks, a flowered plate, a Victrola scratching out a faded tune, tinny and bright, a cow beyond the fence, pail foaming with milk— summer dresses and straw hats and rubber boots stained with pond mud, a cat washing on a stump, and in the distance the voices of men, laughing, sweet and low— scent of camp smoke, clank of pans, dishwater splashed into a bed of sunflowers, a notebook, a pencil, two fat candles and a sweater, for when the night draws close— when two hands slip together beneath a blanket, when the stars rise and the katydids hum and someone begins the story . . . slowly, slowly— “Once, there was a woman who loved to be alive.”
Copyright 2022 Dawn Potter
Dawn Potter’s many books include Accidental Hymn (Deerbrook Editions, 2022). She directs the Frost Place Conference on Poetry and Teaching.
Vox Populi 
This poem made me forget the cold winter wind blowing fiercely against the back of the house. Lovely.✨
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Yes, Dawn is a master of the well-turned descriptive phrase.
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the ending makes me want to reread the poem each time.
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Thanks! I know what you mean.
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For someone who loves, deeply loves & needs images, this is a feast!
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My classified ad:
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I love this poem and the fact you sought and published. Beautiful ending! You’ve enriched my life this foggy morning on Treasure Hammock Ranch while the horses and growing stock eat their grain.
Thankyou so much.
Dawn knows what Jane knows!
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Thanks, Sean!
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