Road Breaker
after Rockwell Kent's The Road Roller
The boss rides his crew late
into the deep freeze
of a wintry January afternoon
in 1909 New Hampshire.
In sledging season, he's got
no time for slip-shod clearing
of snow. Road-breaking takes
ground over gravity, muscled
men harnessed for the pull-
strength of a half-dozen horses
drafted to drag the monstrous
wood-planked barrel drums
that pack the road surface solid
for the sleighs and pungs.
This New England town intends
to marry every other before
spring thaw. Un-minding bone-
chilling wind, the men lumber
twenty-five miles over the roller
roads, smoothing the beds high.
© 2014 Maureen E. Doallas
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Rockwell Kent, 1882-1971, American Painter, Printmaker, Illustrator, and Writer
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2 comments:
Great scene-painting, Maureen. I like especially how the heavy, plodding sounds of the words in these lines — "drafted to drag the monstrous/
wood-planked barrel drums" — give the very feel of what they're imaging.
i like it all
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