Читать книгу Pruning Burning Bushes - Sarah M. Wells - Страница 12

The Pigs

Dad revived the barn—its siding stripped

for a neighbor’s cabinets, the grooved tin roof

rattling in wind on top of rotten trusses—

he buried sagging basement cow stalls

with Midwestern clay and silt, poured cement.

A makeshift pen and pump raised up

our three weaned piglets. I flung half-eaten cobs

in their feeder, rubbed wet snouts,

scratched behind ears, pet stubbled backs.

They rooted, trotted, rolled, and pissed.

We named them Buster, Pinky, Red, and watched

with rested arms on rails for hours.

They escaped one day—split the hillside,

squealed and darted through the valley—

freedom wild in frantic hooves.

I chased Buster with a stick, the dog leash

in my hand dragging through new top soil

in the cul-de-sac. He left prints in bluegrass,

clicked across asphalt driveways and startled

Labradors on porches with his sunburned skin,

until I caught him, walked him home

past landscaped beds. We corralled the hogs

into a truck backed up to the barn on Labor Day.

The concrete floor is clean, a water pump

drips and rusts. The barn cat slinks between

some soggy bales of straw. Look through the gaps

in slats Dad hung. A harvester shredded

cornstalks here, silage suspended in the air.

The sun hung long and bright above the trees

all evening, shadows cast for deer to wander

undetected through rows, acres of long, unending rows.