day 4

wake to a soft and drizzly morning. fried eggs with toast. roam the grounds with a mug of honeyed coffee. that lightning creates nitrogen which causes the plants to glow & grow. a good time to plant seedlings. sweep the covered porch on the second floor. let the dogs out when the chickens were still out. pull rocky away from the coop. play frisbee with sephiroth. dogs and chickens convene peacefully around my feet. power-wash the porch. barn swallow poop streaming off the ledge. sometimes spraying into my face. leftovers for lunch. pull more weeds. at niemeyer’s livestock auction. lambs wail “meh” at each other from across the barn. cows huff quietly. pigs spoon. the dusty musky smell of animals in hay. the show starts. a man herds animals in and around and out with a shaker stick shaped like a big spring onion. r calls out pounds and prices. cows pace. one shits. goats pause warily in corners and dart. stick man pounces upon sold sheep, smearing a line of lime green powder on their woolen backs. a herd of black pigs swarm. into the stage-pen for an audience sitting in a small half-circular stadium through a sliding door, and out onto a weighing scale bought in 1956. children climbing the staired benches. j buys 3 cows for the farm and all of the pigs for t&j’s. said they’re “harder than american pigs to process with all their bristly fur–but they’re below market price, and sausage is sausage.” drive back. take a few beers to a century-old farmhouse with s & a uke. sing for the cows.