Greasing the Plow
No wonder of it: shéer plód makes plough down sillion
Shine, and blue-bleak embers, ah my dear,
Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermilion.
—Gerard Manley Hopkins, “The Windhover”
Sillion is usually called the slice or furrow-slice, sometimes the
mould. . . . When freshly cut a plastic soil with a high clay con-
tent does take on a sheen and, from a distance, the whole field
may gleam for a while in low sunshine.
—Farm Direct UK
My father rarely worshipped using words, though he never
skipped church even when the harvest was late, and surely
not to plow. He taught mostly just by showing. He kept
a bucket with grease and an old paintbrush to paint
the plowshares and rolling coulters so they wouldn’t rust
over the winter, a good job after school for the boy
I was, in dirty coveralls and too-big yellow gloves.
It was strangely pleasing to smear the heavy, smelly,
brown grease across the shiny steel, get it smooth and even,
seal the polished curves and edges from the air.
Next fall I would back the tractor to the plow, hitch up
the lift arms, plug in the hydraulics, drive from shed
to field, drop the plow in the ground. The first earth
scoured the shares clean and I opened the throttle wide,
blasted slowly down the field, hid away the cornstalks
and bean stubble, turned up the black soil in flat thick slices,
saw it break and steam and shine in the blaze of fall sun.
