Here’s the end of the furrow, where the animal turns and hefts the plough. And it is another row, beginning at the head or at the foot, depending on where one chooses to engage the coulter and the share. The wood is old but tempered. It has worn to a roughened sheen. The metal parts help force the energy into the topsoil, into the sod. There is a rhythm that might be observed, a neatness that might be said to resemble stitching. The animal lumbers— it doesn’t sing the song of the shuttle flying through gathered floss, nor of the hummingbird exploding its ruby-colored threads. The field is wide as a year, wide as a century, wide as time itself. I call it by name; I rub its flanks covered with stubble, regard its soft dark eyes shaded sepia. When nothing has yet taken root, it’s almost impossible to imagine each hoof-print unwinding a bobbin of green. Or the land pin-cushioned with fingernail flecks of grain.
In response to thus.