Ivan McGuinness

Sickle

A question on the shed wall
keeps quiet council all winter
until the spring tumult calls
the sickle to sing 

slim chimes
against stone and wind.
My father takes his time 
caressing the crescent bell-

blade, cranked
that cuts might slice
low the rank 
forest of nettles.

A gesture like a maestro
quickening musicians to the score
then stingers bow 
before the hooked baton.

In and out with mechanical ease
his arm keeps time,
in and out the sickle breathes
air that cuts and parts,

raises motes of dust
from each timbered weed,
each sweep his feet adjust
and hobble a half step forward.

Every third pass two
strokes of the stone
ring the edge true
against the dark spittle of sap.

‘If it takes a man and a half a day and a half
to mow a field and a half…?’
the old poser made him laugh
the sickle was his punctuation.

Even now I ponder the math
of all that’s been left behind, 
halting progress has left a path
that I have not followed.

Ivan McGuinness lives and works in Oxford. His work has appeared in Seaside Gothic, Dream Catcher, Dreich and other magazines.