Inch Worm, and: The Three Ferns

Poems by Louise McNei Inch Worm Green worm humping on the stem traces as he travelsEarnestly to map the Earth, ravels and unravelsInch by inch the stem surveys, then the grass and meadow; In the sunset lays his rule on the mountain's shadow; Softly calibrates the shade, humps his careful measure Patiently as though to graph just how far the Quasar. Inch by inch in silence goes, Hump by small humps proving How a patient worm can chart Planets outward moving Outward through expanding timeWild accelerationAs the mad moon's upward climb, Makes his calculation. Then evaluates the grass, blade by blade appraisesNow a rose hip in the sunNow the painted daisies. 61 The Three Ferns Ferns in their time, tricolored three: The green fern growing by the tree, The black fern hardened in the vein Of coal beneath the bulldozed plain, The white fern silvered in the frost Upon the window pane embossed. White is the fern that soon will pass, Etching of crystal on the window glass, Only the faery forest of a dream Melting in sunlight and the kettle's steam, Rune of the future earthlings cannot know, The pale phantasmagora of the snow. "Forget the Past." Old proverbs are profound. Deep in the ribs and canyons underground Where, in the swamps, the Brontasaurus cried, Where in the topic fenlands fern brakes died, Fell with the rotting palm trees, petrified, Layer on layer, oceans rose and fell; Layer on layer, as the "high-walls" tell; The rivers cutting; mountains lift and roll, Mountain on mountain, pressing down the coal. Black is the fern that hardens in the soul. Ferns of the earth-there is but one: The green fern growing in the sun, Fronding the woodland's light and shade, Tracing the stone wall and the glade, Edging the beauty of the world, Its sturdy fiddleheads uncurled To play the wood wind's April rhyme, The mystic notes of green-up time: The poor man's fern in fields of broom, The ostrich, with its royal plume, The sweet fern, stag horn, lady fair, The winter fern, the maiden hair, The fern that walks from here to there . . . Across the moss rock softly goes In pixie shoes with turned-up toes. 62 ...