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By Dwight D. Jenkins

--Rensselaer, NY

John IV made his final pass well beyond

the settling of the late autumnal sun.

It was the last cutting of the year, the great and final cut,

rich with summer’s sighing warm nutrition. 

The fourth was only 24, much too young

for one in such an old and worn condition. 

He sang a little sunset song for his scarred and seizing back,

jangled tight from hours in that fatal same position,

hours that fed the flame of coming night,

the aging soldier’s inquisition:

“I think I may, I think I might

be home before the dying light,

and if I do I’ll fly with you, my crying apparition.”

Even so, old John went round and round and round,

but the only sound this silent night,

his great-grandfather’s tractor,

as four circled one, two and three,

all buried deep beneath the maple tree

in the heart of Mackey’s pasture.