An Unskilled Rotor-Tiller Tiller of the Soil - poem

 

Lawrence Hall

Mhall46184@aol.com

https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/

poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

 

An Unskilled Rotor-Tiller Tiller of the Soil

 

Plough Monday was by-passed some weeks ago

The Virus of Many Names kept me abed

And then the snow and ice kept me inside

And then – indolence, indolence, okay?

 

But today, oh, today!

 

The morning was fresh and cool and damp and still

I wheeled the tiller into the garden patch

Fresh gasoline, then primed the little bulb

And turned the red plastic lever just so

 

And pulled the cord

And pulled the cord

And pulled the cord

And said bad words

And pulled the cord

And pulled the cord

And pulled the cord

And snarled bad words

And pulled the cord –

 

Pow!

 

For smoke and fire

And noise – hooray!

Then forward the tines

 

The tines at first bounced off the new green grass

I pulled the smoke and noise machine back, back

And held the smoke and noise machine in place

And wrestled it, pinning it to the earth until

 

It bit into the grass, the bright spring grass

And hurled it back, and then some earth, and more

And still more earth, sweet earth, the nourishing earth

Flung up and out and back again, and down

 

And there the earth must rest for a few weeks

Then to be turned again, sweet and warm

To receive the ready seeds of happy new life

And join in the miracle of Creation

 

And in the summer when the soft breezes blow

Zinnias and sunflowers and wild marigolds

Will lift their heads and sing hymns to the sun

And bees and hummingbirds hum the “Amen”

 

And in those days I will speak kind words

To them all, and study rotor-tillers no more