All winter your brute shoulders strained against

collars, padding

and steerhide over the ash hames, to haul

sledges of cordwood for drying through spring and

summer,

for the Glenwood stove next winter, and for the

simmering range.

In April you pulled cartloads of manure to spread

on the fields,

dark manure of Holsteins, and knobs of your own

clustered with oats.

All summer you mowed the grass in meadow and

hayfield, the mowing machine

clacketing beside you, while the sun walked high

in the morning;

and after noon's heat, you pulled a clawed rake

through the same acres,

gathering stacks, and dragged the wagon from

stack to stack,

and the built hayrack back, uphill to the chaffy

barn,

three loads of hay a day from standing grass in the

morning.

Sundays you trotted the two miles to church with

the light load

of a leather quartertop...