Coming Home from the Far Field

by Bruce Pratt

Saw case clutched in my swollen hand,
peavey, thermos, slung over my shoulder,
I trudge homeward from the far field,
traversing pasture and stream bed,
regarded by dark, cow-curious eyes,
afternoon yawning toward evening.

Maple, birch, and beech saplings
encroaching on the field’s edge
felled, hauled away, pasture opened
to the sweep of the sun and wind,
leggy trunks, spindly twigs chipped
to fertilize new mushroom beds.

Knowledge one is not born to
fires the blood, my mind marveling
that this work, once done by hand,
began with the rose of dawn,
ended when evening’s darkness
sealed out the last western light,
or fatigue conquered human will.

Aching in aging joint and muscle,
this loud work but tame labor
to the clearing a hundred years ago,
when men plodded in waning light
toward their kitchen’s lonely lamp,
milked cows, washed, and supped,

then bent again by lantern or candle,
to hone axes, saws, knives, and scythes,
as night gathered, children slumbered,
loons called across the spring darkness,
before laying down their wearied bones,
in order to shoulder the task again.