BY KEN BEEN
Copyright is held by the author.
He sounded into Detroit
With his passport embouchure
Through a whistle pipe
From Ontario
A call
Like relatives on a Sunday afternoon
Along 401 towns
Join us
As the crops
Count it off
One last song
And a cornstalk dance
The strumming
Of the field chords
And a voice,
A plea,
Like the last slow pull on a root
In October,
Clotheslines sagging, drop-shouldered
Low
Table cloths dried, folded, put away
The old, wooden chairs left in a circle on the lawn
Flag up on the mailbox
Gone.
***
Ken Been’s writing is published or forthcoming in journals internationally. A sampling includes LIT Magazine, The Primer, Slab, New Croton Review, The Brussels Review, Tipton Poetry Journal and Aethlon, among many others. His work also can be found in anthologies including Remembering Lawrence Ferlinghetti and Remembering Gerald Stern. Additionally, he recently was recognized with “Honorable Mention” for the 2025 Concrete Wolf Chapbook Award. He is from the State of Michigan. In a quirk of geography, “Along the 401 and into Detroit: On the Death of Gord Downie” was written looking south across the Detroit River into Windsor, Ontario.