C. Mikal Oness
Poetry
C. Mikal Oness is the author of Oracle Bones, winner of the Lewis & Clark Poetry Prize, and Water Becomes Bone (New Issues Press). His poems have appeared in numerous journals throughout the U.S. In 2017, his poem “On the Sprocket Side of the Hayrake” was a finalist for Ireland’s Ballymaloe Poetry Prize and appeared in The Moth. He lives on a cottage farm in Southeastern Minnesota with his wife, Elizabeth Oness. He is the founding editor of Sutton Hoo Press, a literary fine press (www.suttonhoopress.com). He is also a potter and a re-emergent alpinist hungrily exploring our diminishing natural world.
Not Grace Exactly
In a hundred rows of corn
A quarter mile long—three of us,
Whatever doves were hiding,
Two shotguns and a .22.
The only time I ever killed
Was by accident. The only thing
I ever shot at, once, was a blackbird.
And the bullet of my .22 hissed
By the ear of my brother’s quiet friend
Who later rested his open palm behind
My neck and continued saying nothing,
But smiled, cased his double-barrel
And laid it down in the bed of his truck
Which was shining from a noon rain.