The Farmer And His Wife (Sestina) Poem by Gert Strydom

The Farmer And His Wife (Sestina)



A girl was lying down flat on her back
with a straw hat at eye height over hair,
she was sun-struck, curling and fair
with a rain cloud ominous and black
drifting in a blue sky and a small track
meandering past and it needed some repair.

Some of your makeup is in need of repair,
there’s a guitar bag slung over your back
where you walk pass the girl at the dirt track
with the strong wind frizzling through your hair
and the sky is already turning black
but the evening up to now is fair.

Slowly you walk past the local fair
with some of the stalls needing repair,
the guitar you are carrying is black
and you walk straight on, do not look back
at the whistles of some men with long hair
while home you take a narrow long track.

Watching our horses on the racetrack
you are really sexy and very fair,
our horses do parade with shining hair
you notice that the stands need some repair
and I am standing somewhat at your back
while you are dressed prettily in black.

The highway is like a ribbon that is black
where it meets the old overgrown farm track,
there are huge blue-gum trees some way back
and you agree that the price of the Lucerne is fair
where some cows graze at the pen, needing repair,
swishing with tails to drive flies from their hair.

I pull my fingers slowly through my hair
and there are streaks of grey in the black,
but the cattle are only doing fair
while my love is coming with the field’s track
that must constantly be kept in repair
and I hear her singing over my back.

There were torn out hair a long time back,
when I met my darling and she was fair,
at a fight at a track, I was in need of repair.

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Gert Strydom

Gert Strydom

Johannesburg, South Africa
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