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Limestone9.com
Poetry from The Last Day of Harvest, by Greg German
Kansas farm & rural themed poetry and personal essays.
All writing, poetry & essays in this website - Copyright © by Greg German, 2019 |
Spring Selections
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Traveling With The River
Knowing winter's clear water will soon be dulled by summer, the two of us wade just a ways down from the old Brock Bridge. Advance scouts, we're alert for yesterday's ware. Abandoned bottles, hubcaps, and other good junk wait between last night's coon tracks melting in the silt and today's sun patting the river's cool bottom. Friendly, the current nudges us farther than we have been before. We forget and let April's path splash above our knees, ignoring dense mud and scavenging sand that sucks at and into our worn canvas shoes. We stop at Holler's Bend, listen---and hearing only ourselves, imagine the sound of trees stretching and buds splitting. It's late. Our mothers will worry. But we decide we are men and are never going home, again. Originally Published in WIND, 1987, V.17, N.61 |
Sow 32 In Stall #9
Ten fresh pigs, their tails pumping with pleasure, bubble along her milk filled tappers. But something deep inside her is stuck. Too long since her last delivery she is tangled in contraction, too weak to push. The wave breaks, and drains away. I am ready for this to be over. At three in the morning I roll up my sleeve and let her oven heat wrap around my arm. My hand soaks through the dark. Elbow deep I find the fourth brother, and by his gumdrop-slick hoof, pull the last pig home. Originally Published in Poet Lore, 1986, V.81, N.3 |
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House In The Middle Of A Field
I know of no one who has lived here. And it has been here forever, a pivot we cramp machinery around behind a full-throttled tractor. The house could have been a corner post so tight set it made no difference how taut or in what direction a wire stretched. The foundation has settled. Wind has chiseled the excitement out of the wood, and the sun has left it grey. Its shingles are receding. There are no curtains. The front door is gone, so it must be open. Inside I mingle with the musty scents eroding from the crisp millers and mummified mice hidden behind the layered, pastel paper wilting from the walls. Children drift through bedroom doors playing with antique toys. Screened by a common farmer face, a man sits on his kitchen chair. He stares beyond a woman in a cotton dress into clouds that might not be rain. I have done my duty. And mine are the last boots to arouse the dusty lull spread across this cold wood floor. On the windward side of the house dad announces there is no better time than now. I stand back. He lights a match. Flames lean from windows, tattered flags at full mast. Originally Published in Kansas Quarterly, 1987, V.19, N.1 |
Bareback On The Palomino
While rebound sounds ricochet away from wings at the bottom corner of a nighthawk's dive, the horses wait. Then, hoof bantering from the top of the hill to the fence, knowing I have brought their oats, their thrill stirs the scent of grazed pasture grass with the strolling fragrance of wandered cattle. Wind-cooled fresh, it mixes with their own lathered odor creating a homey smell not found in any kitchen. I catch the spirited one, and while evening clouds merge red in the west, roll onto his back. We melt into our own wind. Originally Published in Paws & Tales, 1998, V.1 |
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A Psychic Farmer Sees His Every New Year, or
Once Upon A Time In The Twilight Zone It occurs on a Tuesday. By coincidence, June. Hours after he has climbed aboard his tractor, turned the key, throttle up, and spiraled his way through a window of boredom. Given the view, the farmer stares at the future and sees that everything behind him is ahead of him: Weeds wilt. Others grow. The color of harvest blends across wheat fields like sunrise. Men sweat. Women hurry. Combines labor. Stubble fields are tilled. Hot winds blow. Drought threatens or occurs. Thunderstorms, angry behemoths, grumble. Mad fists of lightening strike. Dog days lounge around, fat. Hay is cut, baled, and stacked. Markets fluctuate. Soybeans, sorghum, and corn grow, flourish or not, then molt to crisp brown. Fall harvest comes and goes like a last dance. The air cools. Seed-wheat is meticulously groomed into soil. Cold spills, geese migrate south across Kansas. Leaves, brittle with age, give up and fall from trees. Pregnant cows indulge in split bales of alfalfa. Piglets nudge and bump milk from sows' swelled nipples. Tomato vines are pulled. Last pumpkins rot. It snows. The pond freezes. Night lasts longer than day. Calves appear. Chores acquire the redundant habits of monotony. A kaleidoscope of yellow, baby chicks collage beneath heat-lamps. Rabbits annoy the dog. Green wheat fields thicken. Machinery is greased. The sun flexes. Weeds emerge. The cream-smooth scent of over-turned soil melts into lungs. Markets fluctuate. Spring crops are planted. It rains. Seeds sprout. Cattle are returned to pasture. Cats have kittens. Chickens are butchered. Warm winds ripple up from Texas. Wheat matures. The farmer drives south, turns west at the five-mile-corner, crosses Walnut Creek Bridge, and travels the last stretch to his field. He parks his truck, climbs aboard his tractor, turns the key, throttles up, and spirals his way through a window of boredom. Given the view, the farmer stares at the past. Dust lingers. It is June. Like always, this day is this. Originally Published in Flint Hills Review, 2006, N.11 |
Visit To My First Home
No road comes here anymore. But it's a good walk, and on my way across the field I throw clods at imaginary targets still standing from before. My eyes play along the creek, and I remember things I am told I can't: chickens crowding the coop, marbles in the sidewalk, the time the dog and I snuck off to grandpa's old place. Burr oaks and elms, muscle bound limbs scaled with leaves brush the ground with shade. Crippled, the iron gate sags, its fence gone. Iris hoist their colors proud for surviving the steel that kept us both in the yard. The branch my tire-swing callused while I walked on air is tangled in the grass. I kick dried brush from my bedroom, and push through the kitchen. It's warm standing where the porch should be, and I wonder if everyday is Sunday morning, here, where no road comes and no road leaves. Originally published in A.I.D. Review, 1985, V. 1, # 1 |
