The beads on the farmer’s cheek
glisten in the early evening
as he, seated, listens
to the syllables of trees,
vibrant tymbals,
wing-flicking, wing-clicking,
and summer’s sibilance,
the road’s sweeps of sand,
catching sight
of a waving hand
from a horse
clip-clopping by…
The trees’ bow of glow,
the trees stirred,
nod confirmation of his smile.
He is lost now – in the humble stretch
and hump of shimmering furrows,
an invisible hand lowering the volume
of wind to a tender breeze.
Something else –
besides the sigh of work well done –
something else,
a quiet strange joy
within the breeze
brushes against him,
heaves within him.
A middle aged man
awakes in his room,
having just dreamt
of his distant ancestor,
the farmer of 2 centuries before
when this very region
had been all countryside.
Was it a dream after all
encompassed by past and future?
Or 2 simultaneous realms?
Or something else?
Is the farmer still alive,
the breeze he feels,
what suffuses the breeze
extending itself,
passing through
the middle aged man’s
bedroom window?
Is the farmer’s contentment,
harvest of work well done,
the spirit of the farmer’s smile
now seeping into the man,
tending to the seeds of poetry?
Is the farmer’s strange joy,
the unknown joy
of harvesting poems too,
the unknown feeding
the farmer’s spirit,
encompassing his evening,
even as the poetic spirit
now shows itself
upon the poet’s page?
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