It is not the cold, compared to sledding hay
with teams to frosty cows in Wyoming,
or the frozen breath of calving barns
in Montana—now it is the bones that balk
at unfolding, at rising to lean forward
towards the door, the barn, the truck
and bales stacked high and waiting with
impatient bunches bawling at the gate.
It is the bones with joints worn round
that talk revolt, that threaten strike,
that would rather stay inside and write
than feed hay. All my buck is gone—
rolled downhill or bottom-bales engineered
into stairs, I build pyramids instead
to load the truck—and wonder why
in this modern world. But the bones know,
once slow momentum holds—it’s all
for the new on the same old ground to see.
