The Dairy Barn

The Dairy Barn

The Dairy Barn

Lake Delaware, 2015

 

Rocky meadow rolls down to her foundation stones

As proud as any mountain, she still stands

Hanging on

 

Though her bones of timber here and there

Show through

And the metal on her roof

Finds the ground

 

Will summer swallows still come ‘round?

What will they do

When she finally comes lumbering down?

 

No dairyman could pass her by

And not take in her some pride

She’s all the rugged poetry of farming

Mountainsides

 

It’s a poem in a language

So few now recognize

As they come through

 

On their summer country drives

And, as the final farmer dies

She’ll sigh a last good-bye

And she’ll let go

 

Under the plumy bulk

Of the quiet Catskill snow.