COUNTRY ROAD

I can’t forget a gaunt grey barn Like a face without an eye That kept recurring by field and tarn Under a Cape Cod sky. I can’t forget a woman’s hand, Roughened and scarred by toil That beckoned clear-eyed children tanned By sun and wind and soil. Beauty and hardship, bent and bound Under the selfsame yoke: Babies with bare knees plump and round And stooping women folk.