Milking
From somewhere above my eyes
I enjoy looking down
and seeing myself do this,
forearms flexing, veins bulging,
squish, squish in a steady rhythm;
splash, splash milk-on-metal
in a steel pail slowly
covers the bottom while
the feeding goat slowly
empties her bowl.
She turns her head to look
at me crouched beside her, one hand
behind the udder, guarding the pail
from her inevitable kick, milking
with the other, squeezing from the top,
pinching off the teat. She has to relax
to be milked, to let it all down,
and to help I stop occasionally
to massage the udder which responds
to my touch by warming and releasing
new pockets of milk that fills the teat
under my fingers, which I squeeze out
into the pail as the goat grows restless
and my hands grow tired. But the rhythm
continues, squish, squish, as the goat
kicks and my hand catches the blow
and the milk is safe in the pail
below her udder.
We do this every day,
twice a day,
at the same time each day,
except Saturday,
my wife's day
to milk, my day
to sleep in, but later that day,
as with every other day,
we end the day
as we began the day,
milking
with that squish squish rhythm,
and the metallic splash splash
till the milk covers the bottom
of the pail while the warm yielding
udder empties and the splash splash
itself is softer, warmer for the company
it finds in the cold steel pail.
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