What I Think When I Smell Hay
By Maureen Ash
All over the county
in this lull between rains
farmers have mowed hay, raked
it, fluffed it, fussed
like bridesmaids that it should lie
in long flounces under the arched
fickle sky.
The scent of it rolls
off the fields like a popular
song all the radios play. I see
my pirate dad, right arm longer
because of the hay hook he used
to pull bales from the chute, knees
absorbing the roll
of the hay rack on its swells
of farm field, how he could stack
that load so high, keep
himself a little nook in which to pivot
and hoist a bale up over his head, pop
it back to lave room for another.
The loaded racks swayed,
beat into the yard like ships
sailing upwind, all of us swarming
to unload the loot
into the barn’s wide, light-seamed loft.
Later, the cows summarily milked,
supper in the dark though it was summer,
the littlest child drooping over his plate,
the ret of us a merry crew, our dad
satisfied with the day’s haul,
Mother washing our faces
before her light kiss.
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