I sneak among the stalks, pale and flighty
for all the ways you will be my end.
If you see me, I am cornered;
if you say my name, I am dead.
The recognition is the end of me, I know.
Your gaze sweeps these well-tilled rows
like an expert estimation of what is verdant,
what is struggling, what is dead.
In your gaze is my own estimable worth:
what can I produce? what fruit
can still be culled from my tired bones?
If you see me, I am cornered;
if you appraise me, I am dead.