They were a man’s words, a ballad of an old time
Sung among green blades, whistled atop a hill.
They were words lost to any page, tender and fierce,
And quiet and final, and quartered in a rhyme.
This was a man’s song, a ballad of ridge and hound,
Of love and loss. The words blossomed in his throat.
This was a man’s singing alone behind the plow
With a bird’s excellence, a man’s shagbark sound.