Days roll yellow over old snow, battles vivid again under melting ice. Blood of their feet, arterial. What did they mutter there of mothers, and all yet to grow? Letters home buried with them, or sent on in tatters.

Each day greeted according to its lighting of the mind. Impediments in abeyance. The way ahead a matter of eating well and waiting. Reserves for once, in reserve; idle, watching clouds.

Cumulus gone gray, diffuse above tentative resolve. The hush of hiding in weeds, a gaze following stem up to wilt. Small birds pause there, looking away, then—angled into flight. Seeds shedding from petal mass in ochre light. Still light enough for annotations in journal’s margins. Scribbling, with rifle heavy in crook of writing arm.

Cataracts. The burns almost healed. But the sun still registered, arriving ... arriving. Every drift and snowy expanse sending warmth of radiance back. And on winds, the remains of smoke. A blank landscape divulging the whereabouts of charred farm buildings. Then night. And sun. And night again. Soon snowdrops and hellebores up through snow. Lovely still by touch, though poisonous.

* Publisher’s Notes:

1. This prose poem was written after the version of Quattro Stagioni which is held by The Tate Museum. “Tate’s version is the second of two cycles; the first is in the collection of the Museum of Modern Art, New York. Both cycles were begun in 1993 ... and completed in 1994....”
https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/twombly-quattro-stagioni-primavera-t07887

For more about the artist, see this pair of articles:

“Making his mark: 10 things to know about Cy Twombly” at Christie’s (5 May 2022):
https://www.christies.com/features/10-things-to-know-about-Cy-Twombly-12198-3.aspx

“A man for all seasons” (“Cy Twombly is obsessed with time, love, and doomed desire—and his Quattro Stagioni is a masterpiece, says Jonathan Jones”) in The Guardian (14 January 2003):
https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2003/jan/14/artsfeatures


2. “The Death of a Soldier” by Wallace Stevens (1879-1955) was first published in Poetry Magazine (1918), and reprinted in the third edition (1931) of his first book, Harmonium (source: Wikipedia). Text of the poem appears at The Poetry Foundation:
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/148732/the-death-of-a-soldier

Daryl Scroggins

has taught creative writing and literature at The University of Texas at Dallas, The University of North Texas, and the Writer’s Garret, in Dallas. He now lives in Marfa, Texas. He is the author of This Is Not the Way We Came In, a collection of flash fiction and a flash novel (Ravenna Press), Winter Investments: Stories (Trilobite Press), and Prairie Shapes: A Flash Novel (winner of the 2004 Robert J. DeMott Prose Contest). His poems, short stories, and creative nonfictions have appeared in magazines and anthologies across the country, including Blink Ink, Cutbank, Eastern Iowa Review, New Flash Fiction Review, Star 82 Review, and Third Wednesday, among others.

More on the Web: By, About, and Beyond

⚡ Roadshow, microfiction by Daryl Scroggins in MacQueen’s Quinterly, aka MacQ (Issue 15, September 2022); one of three pieces by Scroggins selected as Finalists in “The Question of Questions” Ekphrastic Writing Challenge

⚡ Spring, microfiction by Scroggins in MacQ (Issue 12, March 2022)

⚡ Writer Boy, microfiction in MacQ (Issue 4, July 2020); nominated by MacQ for Best Microfiction 2021

⚡ Face of the Deep, ekphrastic prose poem in MacQ (Issue 3, May 2020)

⚡ Field Trips, flash fiction by Scroggins in KYSO Flash (Issue 12, Summer 2019)

⚡ New to School, microfiction in Eclectica (Jan/Feb 2018)

⚡ Two Fictions: “Almost Baptized” and “Against the Current” in New Flash Fiction Review (Issue 10, January 2018)

⚡ Eight Stories: A Mini-Chapbook by Daryl Scroggins at Web del Sol