The clash and the clatter of mowing-machines
Float up where the old man stands and leans
His trembling hands on the worn old snath,
As he looks afar in the broadening path,
Where the shivering grasses melt beneath
A seven-foot bar and its chattering teeth.
"When a man gits old," says he,
"When a man gits old,
He is mighty small pettaters
As I've just been told."
"I used to mow at the head of the crew,
And I cut a swath that was wide as two.
- Covered a yard, sah, at every sweep;
The man that follered me had to leap.
I made the best of the critters squeal,
And nary a feller could nick my heel.
The crowd that follered, they took my road
As I walked away from the best that mowed.
"But I can't keep up with the boys no more,
My arms are stiff and my cords are sore:
And they've given this rusty scythe to me -
It has hung two years in an apple-tree -
And told me to trim along the edge
Where the mowing-machine has skipped the ledge.
"It seems, sah, skurcely a year ago
That I was a-showin' 'em how to mow,
A-showin' 'em how, with the tanglin' grass
Topplin' and fallin' to let me pass;
A-showing 'em how, with a five-foot steel,
And never a man who could nick my heel.
"But now it's the day of the hot young blood,
And I'm doin' the job of the fuddy-dud'
Hacking the sides of the dusty road
And the corner clumps where the men ain't mowed
"And that's the way
A man gits told,
He's smaller pettaters
When he grows old."
Notes
From Holman F. Day's Up In Maine published 1901.
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Liked the dialect that is used here- makes it very authentic and realistic. Liked the rhythm, rhyme and flow as well. Such disadvantages of growing old-cannot do the physical labor he once could.
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From a woman's point of view. I see the frustration in the character's life that he no longer is able to move, work, and play as he once did but as Jim so aptly says: "seed for the next crop!" has to come from somewhere. This man has an indomitable spirit, not ready to sit on his porch watching the work, he’s out there still doing what he’s able to do, - a metaphor for life I believe.
I’ve enjoyed the poem very much, though I did trip on some of the spellings as they are accented but after I came to grips with that I was able to read and enjoy the whole work. Von ~ -
True oh so true, As the song goes: "I ain't as good as I once was...." Anyway, we sill do what we can with what we can when we can.
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Excellent
Day has captured the sadness of aging in this wonderful piece. The desire to keep going, the memory of past glories and the reality of ones present place in the margins of life "Hacking the sides of the dusty road". BUT present here is also the desire and the determination to keep going and not be beaten. He may be told he's small potatoes but even small potatoes have value for food, energy and as seed for the next crop!
Well observed and well written. -
Time is cruel sometimes, it steals away the things we take for granted and the things we take pride in, like our strength and physical superiority. For Day's character it's suddenly feeling worthless, but worse, it's that others see him that way.
The vernacular is informal, lending to a somewhat humorous telling, but beneath, like a lot of Maine humor, there's a melancholy truth to it.
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