Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, PEASANT, by ALFRED FRANCIS KREYMBORG


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

PEASANT, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: It's the mixture of peasantry
Last Line: That birds descend from.
Subject(s): Birds; Hope; Peasantry; Optimism


It's the mixture of peasantry
makes him so slow.
He waggles his head
before he speaks,
like a cow
before she crops.
He bends to the habit
of dragging his feet
up under him,
like a measuring-worm:
some of his forefathers,
stooped over books,
ruled short straight lines
under two rows of figures
to keep their thin savings
from sifting to the floor.
Should you strike him
with a question,
he will blink twice or thrice
and roll his head about,
like an owl
in the pin-pricks
of a dawn he cannot see.
There is mighty little flesh
about his bones,
there is no gusto
in his stride:
he seems to wait
for the blow on the buttocks
that will drive him
another step forward --
step forward to what?
There is no land,
no house,
no barn,
he has ever owned;
he sits uncomfortable
on chairs
you might invite him to:
if you did,
he'd keep his hat in hand
against the moment
when some silent pause
for which he hearkens
with his ear to one side
bids him move on --
move on where?
It doesn't matter.
He has learned
to shrug his shoulders,
so he'll shrug his shoulders now:
caterpillars do it
when they're halted by a stick.
Is there a sky overhead? --
a hope worth flying to? --
birds may know about it,
but it's birds
that birds descend from.





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