I
Diesel pulls the chisel plow
Digging the furrows deep,
Breaking up the frost-kissed ground
For the seeds of winter wheat.
Half a day gone in circles
Like an eagle … or a buzzard soars.
All I hear is the piston’s sound -
The tractor’s steady roar.
The last round done, I pull the choke
To kill the burly beast.
The work is done. My back is broken
As night creeps into the east.
A moment’s rest in a day
Gives silence after the sound.
A drop of sweat waters the hay.
A Bob White sings.
A young boy dreams
Of fleeing this needy ground.
II
Before I could drive, I’d sit in fear
On the fender above the six-foot wheel.
And watch my dad shift the grimy gears
Silently preaching,
Quietly teaching,
Me to master the tractor’s steel.
It was hard to grasp in the dim-lit past
That I wasn’t just digging rows.
I was learning not to grind too fast,
Slow and steady
Making ready,
For the seeds sown in my soul.
III
Gasoline pushes the city cars round,
Scarring the insides deep.
Just below the radio’s sound
You can hear thoughts to vile to speak.
Half a day in the city streets
The dogs eat dogs and feed
Off the hands they shake
of those they meet
And the throats of those they bleed.
With the work week done, it’s time to crawl
In a concrete barn with those like me
Who drown their nights in alcohol
And dream of fields and trees.
Sometimes at night I sleep alone,
But every night I dream
Of places not so far from here,
And I hear
The Bob White calling me home
IV
What I’ve been and what I am
Can never hope to meet.
You cannot keep
A lion and lamb.
You just can’t plow concrete.
If you read these lines, hear these words,
Scratch your head, and wonder how
I put these words to the song of a bird
Then know:
The rhythm came from a chisel plow,
And a Bob White taught me the verse.
