The Wood Handled Shovel Poem by John F. McCullagh

I take its smooth wood in my hands
to turn the earth as spring returns.
I make straight furrows in my garden
Like those before me worked the land.

This was Dad's shovel years ago
And in my father's callused hands
it coaxed our plot to yield us fruit
as good as any farmer's stand.

Outside of faded photographs
So few of father's things remain
His house torn down, his stuff dispersed.
his kingdom shrunken to a grave.

Of all the things that I possess
this little shovel made of wood
is my link to Him I loved
and to a time when life was good.



J.M.