Friday, August 19, 2011

Girl on a Tractor


Girl on a Tractor
by Joyce Sutphen, from Good Poems, ed. Garrison Keillor, 2002


I knew the names of all the cows before
I knew my alphabet, but no matter the
subject; I had mastery of it, and when
it came time to help in the fields, I
learned to drive a tractor at just the right
speed, so that two men, walking
on either side of the moving wagon
could each lift a bale, walk towards

the steadily arriving platform and
simultaneously hoist the hay onto
the rack, walk to the next bale, lift,
turn, and find me there, exactly where
I should be, my hand on the throttle,
carefully measuring out the pace.

No comments:

Post a Comment