August 1, 2026
Photo by Daniel Bradley on Unsplash
For Joe (Josef) Parko
The log where my dad perched as a bluebird
in the full sun
was carried by water’s flow
to tree shade.
In its split center,
it has collected
pine needles
and dirt and twigs
from the summer torrents
that have rushed through.
There are wild sunflowers growing around
it. It is cool
there in the shade and
I can see how it is both
falling apart
and coming together.
August 2026
Kim Parko is a mother-scholar of the hedge. She is the author of The Grotesque Child (co-winner 2015 Tarpaulin Sky Press Book Prize) and Cure All (Caketrain Press, 2010). She is a professor at the Institute of American Indian Arts and a PhD candidate reimagining academic thinking, reading, and writing through a nearby arroyo.
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