Middlefield, Ohio 1:45 P.M.
Updated on January 5, 2010
Middlefield, Ohio...1:45 P.M.
I stopped my car upon
an old dirt road
that they called Jug,
and killed the engine
with a twisted wrist,
then rolled down
my window and just
listened to the utter silence
of an Amish community
on a hot and humid
spring day.
Through the haze
beneath a huge
shady maple I spied.....
The ancient gnarled
hands of
the Amish man,
gripped
tightly on his
mid-spring task,
his sweat soaked,
white muslin back,
bent over his plow,
ripping anything but
swift furrows for
the birth of corn
mumbling in his
old country speech
at the rocks plaguing him,
the not so flying
dutchman crept
over endless ancient fields.
I am sure he pined for
a lemonade in
the cool shade
of his dogwood trees,
as he dogged
the wood of
his plow handle,
ripping huge bites
from the earth
that would soon
sustain him.
©-MFB III
