The Hard Way

Posted by Dave Bonta on August 19, 2007 (last modified at 7:51 pm, 4/21/08)

Our barefoot summer
ended at the edge
of a mowed field
in August: goldenrod stubs
like freshly sharpened pencils,
hay salted with thistle barbs
& the odd nest of baby
meadow voles orphaned
by the mower’s blade,
pink as erasers.
We learned the hard way:
one quick dash across
the stubble left holes
in our horn-tough feet.
They bled just a little,
but sprouted taproots of pain
under every step
that lasted into September,
when buses the color
of goldenrod bore us
back into waxed hallways
& the squeak of rubber.

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16 Responses to The Hard Way

  1. marja-leena says:
    August 19, 2007 at 12:36 pm

    Sent me right back to school – very evocative!

    Reply
  2. Dana says:
    August 19, 2007 at 12:39 pm

    Lovely.

    Reply
  3. Peter says:
    August 19, 2007 at 1:54 pm

    but sprouted taproots of pain
    under every step
    that lasted into September,

    Handsome transition into September, predating the buses. Because for those of us learning the hard way, the sprouts start now.

    Reply
  4. beth says:
    August 19, 2007 at 2:25 pm

    A very fine poem, Dave.

    Reply
  5. Bill says:
    August 19, 2007 at 6:09 pm

    Oh you poor orphan!

    Reply
  6. pohanginapete says:
    August 19, 2007 at 6:18 pm

    Excellent, Dave. I particularly like the way this calls out to so many senses.

    Reply
  7. Bill says:
    August 19, 2007 at 8:17 pm

    Pretty amazing Dave. I get a hospital, as a waxy floored point of origin, destination too.

    Do you say “staub” up in your hills?

    Reply
  8. Dave says:
    August 19, 2007 at 9:22 pm

    Thanks for the comments. I’m surprised this many people are even online on a weekend! I hate to sound too self-deprecating here, but let me just say that if this poem succeeds as well as y’all seem to think, it was not on account of any special inspiration. Just writing to occupy the time and give my mind a workout.

    Bill – No, I never heard that. Must be more of an Ozarks thing.

    Reply
  9. Bill says:
    August 19, 2007 at 9:42 pm

    If I were a linguist I might say “staub” was a hill relic of older English before a vowel shift or something like that, but really, I dunno. I googles-up in storytelling in Appalachia, meaning “stab” as in to kill a person. Here I think of it as broken tree limb if a noun, or something between a poke and a stab if a verb, generally with a result of getting perforated. I guess it came here out of Kaintuck. I’ve really come to like the word as it connotes something edgier and more robust than any “stub” I knew in the city. Here, “staples” are “steeples” and I quite glad of it.

    Reply
  10. Bill says:
    August 19, 2007 at 9:49 pm

    Oh and I really like the fight in the title. For a spell, after thinking about phantom root pain, I ran a nonsense headline in my head: “Apprehended Truants Get Suspended Severance”.

    Reply
  11. Dave says:
    August 20, 2007 at 8:32 am

    Bill – That’s all new information to me; thanks. I hadn’t even thought consciously about the cousinhood between stub and stab until now.

    Reply
  12. Fred Garber says:
    August 20, 2007 at 1:41 pm

    Captures the moment of transition perfectly!

    Reply
  13. Dave says:
    August 20, 2007 at 3:44 pm

    Thanks, Fred.

    Reply
  14. Pica says:
    August 20, 2007 at 4:20 pm

    I really like this one too. The words stab as hard as the stalks, as hard as the sharpened pencils will….

    Reply
  15. bev says:
    August 20, 2007 at 8:38 pm

    Ouch! Brings back memories
    of walking barefoot over stubble.
    Very much liked the
    buses the colour of goldenrod.

    Reply
  16. Dave says:
    August 20, 2007 at 10:35 pm

    Thanks, bev and Pica. I’m beginning to sort of like this poem myself now.

    Reply

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