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Thomas Halloran – Ⅰ

Remembered Beneath a Planter’s Moon 

 

 

As dawn breaks chill on the north end of Honshu,

they load the contraption the farmer then drives all day,

back and forth, except for stops to replace

a stack of the seedling trays that have ratcheted

down his rig, their sprouts in tufts patterning

paddy sheen.  The three women chase his clatter

barefoot, to repair tufts the machinery skipped

or mangled by planting shoots from their pails

with heron-quick stoops.  Plot after plot

until dusk.  When it’s dark, and a brimming

moon like this one lifts, it silvers everything.

Even their dreaming the bristle up from shine.

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