Feels like an honest day’s work
Hands dirty, clothes dirty
Body fatigued
Easy to slip from attention
to numbness
and on into sleep
Feels good to work as a team
Never abating the pace of the labor —
Hum of the motion of sharing the effort —
till every last thing is done
Heat of the animals
Heaving and powerful —
Holding them firmly
while soothing them softly
Treat them with iron and silk
The sound and the smell of the shears
Precision and speed of the shearer
The texture and spring of the fiber
Gathered up quickly
and passed to the sorters
in grade labeled baskets
over the fence
And I didn’t feel tired till the pause
when a wave from behind me
rose up and engulfed me
and sent me to where
all the ambient sounds —
bird calls and bleating —
took on different meanings
drifting me closer to dream.
©Wendy Mulhern
July 2, 2012
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