This isthe summerthe RioGrande willremember asthe summerthe childrenwere takenfrom fathersand motherswho broughtthem tothe Rio GrandeThe lawof droughthas deliveredits troubleto theRio Grandewhere ranchersonce livedin ahouse solow tothe thornywindblown groundyou haveto crawlto enterits darknessas Idid afterthe Rio Grandedried frommy handThe RioGrande Idipped myhand inafter crossingover intomotherhood isalso theone sawingthrough thedesert likea sustainedhowl Afterthe RioGrande driedfrom myhand itsdisappearance accumulatedsadness whenI learneda ribbonof stoneswould replacethe RioGrande threadingthrough greenground-puffs ofmourning lovegrassand cactiwith flowerslike thebeginnings ofwildfire Whenit thundersone summernight Iam notsure ifI amhearing thedrought breakingor thewatery soundof anendangered animaldrinking fromthe RioGrande itsfear thesize ofa smallammo canThe RioGrande holdsTexas inthe palmof itshand orcould itbe theRio Grandeis reallythe fistof theUnited StatesI amnot surethe RioGrande remembersturquoise-tipped dragonfliesbobbling overthe ruineddock thecloud-haired Americangrandmothers whoooooed overthe rapidsin apillowy raftthe cactuswith flowerslike poolsof bloodthe timeits tributariesmet andlike loverspushed theirbeds togetherso whenthe RioGrande turnsover inits bedcreating therustle ofthe Rio GrandeI askWhich oneof thechildren iscrying becausehow cananyone sleepthrough thisstorm
The Rio Grande
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“The Rio Grande” from THE SEEDS: by Cecily Parks.
Published by Alice James Books on October 14, 2025.
Copyright © 2025 by Cecily Parks.
All rights reserved.
Reproduced by Poetry Daily with permission.
Cecily Parks is the author of three poetry collections, including The Seeds (Alice James Books, 2025). The recipient of the Lucille Medwick Memorial Award, she is the guest editor of Best New Poets 2025 and editor of the anthology The Echoing Green: Poems of Fields, Meadows, and Grasses. Her poems appear in The New Yorker, A Public Space, The Nation, The New Republic, several editions of The Best American Poetry, and elsewhere. She teaches in the MFA Program at Texas State University and lives in Austin.
"Women and the natural world take center stage in these precise and visionary poems by Parks (O’Nights). The collection interrogates interiority, motherhood, and the choices of famous female figures ... Parks memorably evokes the textures and intricacies of life on earth."
—Publishers Weekly
"The exquisite earthen poems of Cecily Parks in The Seeds help us feel more embodied, tethered to the earth, our lives, deep time, the nubby fragrances of mystery. Magnificently delicate and wildly strong all at once, these poems are perfect precision of living and seeing, shaped into lines. Mother Being, Human Being, Cosmic Haunted Being, all beings layering, inviting greater presence—The Seeds is a triumph."
—Naomi Shihab Nye, author of Everything Comes Next: Collected & New Poems
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