Could taste those potatoes in the first line. Ate many a skillet of fried "Arsh" potatoes growing up; the bacon grease and sometimes chopped onion gave them flavor under rivers of ketchup. Of course they taste different when that's all you have, day after day after day. Thanks for sharing this poignant and lovely poem, connecting "peasants" from many places.
Thinking of my Dad who called himself a tinkerer, of the old 46 Chevy that sat out in our pasture for years as he kept the newer cars running. The well and septic system , the electric fences, he kept them all going, all while he milked the cow every day and baled hay in the summer. On our small farm, if my dad couldn’t fix it, it wouldn’t get fixed. And he worked full-time at a union job in a meat packing plant. I can’t tell my story anymore without telling his story, and my Mom’s, and their parents and grandparents and their ancestors. The older I get, the more I feel their presence, as real now as it was 50 years ago. Sometimes my sense of connection to them is overwhelming. This is a beautiful poem, thank you.
Could taste those potatoes in the first line. Ate many a skillet of fried "Arsh" potatoes growing up; the bacon grease and sometimes chopped onion gave them flavor under rivers of ketchup. Of course they taste different when that's all you have, day after day after day. Thanks for sharing this poignant and lovely poem, connecting "peasants" from many places.
Thinking of my Dad who called himself a tinkerer, of the old 46 Chevy that sat out in our pasture for years as he kept the newer cars running. The well and septic system , the electric fences, he kept them all going, all while he milked the cow every day and baled hay in the summer. On our small farm, if my dad couldn’t fix it, it wouldn’t get fixed. And he worked full-time at a union job in a meat packing plant. I can’t tell my story anymore without telling his story, and my Mom’s, and their parents and grandparents and their ancestors. The older I get, the more I feel their presence, as real now as it was 50 years ago. Sometimes my sense of connection to them is overwhelming. This is a beautiful poem, thank you.
Wow. What a beautiful, powerful poem…thank you , and Happy Easter .