Selected Poems by Philip Hodgins

Author:Philip Hodgins
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Ligature Pty Limited
Published: 2021-11-14T02:13:09+00:00

Milk Cream Butter

He’d get up every morning before the sun

had cleared the treeline on his neighbour’s creek,

and while the sound of magpies trickled in

the slightly opened window of his room

he’d take whatever clothes he’d worn all week,

a tattered pile that mostly smelled of him,

and shake them out and put them on again.

That time of day the paddock by the house

was brittle with a covering of frost

so when he went to get his seven cows

it left a zig-zag trail of darker prints

where the silver grass got crushed beneath his boots.

The cows would wander down along a fence

that led them through a set of open gates

and when they’d turn into the narrow lane

he’d notice how their cautious feet would mince

the gravel-filling with the mud again.

Arriving at the milking shed the queue

of weighted cows would always be the same.

They’d practised twice a day and now they knew

the sequence and the distance off by heart.

They knew the routine of the single bail

and after that how far to keep apart.

So there was nothing much he had to do

except to chain them in and wet the teats

then draw the lines of milk into the pail

between his legs, a tight metallic gasp

that changed into exquisite frothy breaths.

In less than half an hour he’d have them done

and while they sauntered back the way they’d come

he’d go out to the separating room

and tip the previous morning’s creamless milk

into two pig troughs that used to be a drum

and then he’d pour each bucketful of warm

fresh milk into a metal cooling dish.

Beside them was a wooden butter-churn

that looked like some sideshow magician’s prop.

He’d fill it up with sour cream and turn

the handle steadily until the fat

began to float in globules on the top.

A final rapid stirring firmed them up

he’d slide a bucket underneath, then pull

the plug and let the buttermilk escape

before he’d fill the small vat nearly full

of water, rinse the butter clean, then add

some salt and take the soapy mixture out

in handfuls, which he’d torture like a rag,

removing with a twist the final drops.

The rest was just a kind of copyright.

He’d press the butter into one-pound pats

with an emu imprinted on the tops

denoting him, and when the job was done

he’d notice that those blocks of golden light

were glowing deeper than the early sun.

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