| As
she smells the clean sheets the farmer's wife thinks of the
1930's. Wind whips the clothes on the line, blows her dress tight
against her heavy legs. The farmer in his dirty overalls searches through years of broken machinery behind the barn, searches through tall sunflowers, through the nests of rabbits and mice with a wrench in his hand, looking for exactly the right part or one that might do. Seven skinny cows lie in the mud where the tank overflows. Throughout the long afternoon the windmill continues to pump long draughts of cool water. |