Killdeer

[billy]

a well done villanilly. i like it when the refrains are slight different through altering the punctuation or an odd word. i think the two commas in the first line a little to much, for me it makes a perfectly good line a not so good line in that it jars a tad to much. i mention a couple of nits below but they are just nits, on the whole this is a good villanelle.

I stand, like Ruth, amidst this alien corn
that shudders to the gentle touch of wind
and sings to me the loss of being born.

I sneak my stranger's hand to stroke a horn
and shuck it bare just like a passing friend
I stand like Ruth. Amidst this alien corn

I'm stripped and shorn, my bluebell dress is torn i love the sonics of this line.
and tossed to join the wind, a lover's bend
that sings to me the loss of being born.

So unlike fields of gorse and whin the thorn is whin redundant, if not does it need a comma after it?
that damps my legs with blood, as I pretend
I stand like Ruth, amidst this alien corn.

My mind now grazes with the unicorn,
not lying in this bend unskinned and thinned,
that sings to me the loss of being born.

Somewhere there is a field of rape unworn
I go there in my mind, I rise unpinned the two I's feel too much, a suggestion would be to make the latter 'and' or 'to'
and stand like Ruth amidst this alien corn
and sing along, the loss of being born.