LAMENT FOR THE LARD FIRKIN

 

 

Lard Firkin.  Chain Trace.  Thunder Mug.

We don�t need these words anymore.

 

No one said abstract expressionism

when they whitewashed the maples.

 

The Zenith voice box took up one whole corner

with its fa�ade like a cathedral window.

 

No one said fa�ade.

No one said cathedral

 

though they ran a plumb line

and built a Methodist church.

 

Clapboard.  Woodstove.  Altar Call.

They dismantled two hogs

 

to make it through the winter.

Souse Meat.  Cracklings.  Liver Pudding.

 

Those too can go.

You don�t have to know a treadle

 

from a two-man saw.

Come butter come

 

is no way to talk.

Goodbye good words

 

and the mouths they fit.

We don�t need names now

 

for the gear to get up a mule.

We don�t need a wagon tongue,

 

and saying it

will not make it so.

 

 

 

Michael Chitwood