Arise from your rope-strung bed, Clabe Mott,
The sun rakes the fields, your farm stands fallow,
The mouldboard rusts, the plowstock stands upturned,
The harness falls in heaps within your sagging barn
And your stock runs free upon the brambled hills.
The beard is thin upon your face, Clabe Mott,
Your hands are slender as a willow’s bough.
How could your slim feet plod the furrows down?
How could you hold a mountain in your arms,
Or slay a forest with your papered hands?
Fetch out the fiddle, Clabe, draw the ready bow,
Let crabgrass march, let foxtail drown the patch,
Let dull-chains slacken, the poplars stand unhewn,
Forget the partridge in the fence-row thatch.
When you strike fire on your fiddle, Clabe,
The waters wait, the winds break their pace,
The corn grows tall, the shoat farrows young,
The foals race pasture with the golden mare;
Strong men wait, calloused hands go slack,
The oaks go down with thunder in the singing air.