A Country Affair

John Grey

The farmer was out mending fences.
Anything broken or buckled or rotted
was his domain.

Not even sunset put a stop to him.
He breathed the scent of cut pastures.
It was so much better than anything indoors.

His wife, his brother,
were red with sex.
Even as they rolled away
from the coupling,
deep outlines remained.

The brother stood at the window
naked and tall,
saw the farmer in the distance.
“He doesn’t know what he’s missing,”
the brother said to himself.
But what if he did know?
And he wasn’t missing it?  

Night breeze rose out of the cornstalks
and blustered.
The air, where it touched the farmer,
felt like another’s skin.

The wife and brother,
began to look everywhere
but at each other.
He scrambled around on the floor
for his clothes.
She wrapped a scarf around her throat.
Not for warmth. More for dignity.

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