Barely daylight and I hear him hoeing
heaving forceful whacks, closing, opening
a winding net of rivulets
through his apple orchard.

Rain water shadows follow him
down furrowed caliche ditches
filling their circles around trunks,
the rising wet saturating dry soil.

Hoeing and whacking and scraping
the old man switches moats near the house,
metal clanging rhythmic, and the earth shakes
giving way to his will.

Working back up hill undulating ditch beds lock
scattering the morning mist. He sends drink
to cherries, pears, apricots.
In his seventies, my father-in-law tends

his orchard, and I, drowsy with waking
marvel at the thundering strength
of an old man who feeds his soil,
who knows his land.