The earth parted; it fell back from the shovel plow; it boiled over the share. I walked the fresh furrow and balls of dirt welled between my toes. There was a smell of old mosses, of bruised sassafras roots, of ground new-turned. We broke out three furrows. Then Uncle Jolly stood aside and let me hold the handles. The mule looked back, but he kept going. The share rustled like drifted leaves. It spoke up through the handles. I felt the earth flowing, steady as time.

We turned the plow at the end of the third row. “This land’s so rooty,” Uncle Jolly said, “I’m going to let you work over what I’ve already broken. You can try busting furrow middles. Strike center, giving left nor right, and go straight as a die.”

I grasped the reins and handles. “Get along,” I called, big as life. The mule didn’t budge. He lifted his plugged ears and looked back at me, sly and stubborn.

“He’s a regular Simon Brawl all right, with steelyard peas for hoofs,” Uncle Jolly said.

The mule started after I threw dirt on him. He went down the first row peart enough, ears standing end-up, for Uncle Jolly began singing at the top of his voice.

Oh, I had a little gray mule,

His name was Simon Brawl,

He could kick a chew terbacker

out o’ yore mouth

And never tetch yore jowl.

I plowed three furrows and pride swelled in me as sap blows a willow bud. It was like being master where till now I’d only stood in awe; it was finding strength I’d no knowing of. When I doubled back on the fourth row, I saw Uncle Jolly sitting on the ground, leaning against a chestnut stump amidst the stickweeds, his eyes closed to the sun. The mule saw Uncle Jolly too, and his ears drooped. He began to walk faster. The harness rattled on his bony body. The furrow crooked a bit and I got uneasy. “Hold back thar,” I shouted, but he didn’t mend his way.

At the fifth row’s end I looked anxiously at Uncle Jolly, hoping he would take over. One glance and I saw he had gone to sleep. I was ashamed to call. The mule hastened the furrow, the plow jiggling, scooping dirt, running crooked as a blacksnake’s track. I jerked the lines. I shouted all the mule names I’d ever heard. The share hooked a root and the reins pulled from my hands. The plow jumped a furrow, rising alive-like. And then I called Uncle Jolly, being at last more frightened than ashamed.

We no longer bore north and south. The mule cut northwest, southeast, back and forth, catty-cornered. My feet flew over the ground. We plowed a big S. We made a long T, crossing it on the way back. I reckon we made all the book letters. We struck into the un-broken tract, gouging a great furrow, around and around, curling inward, tight as a watch-spring. I couldn’t shout or raise a sound. There was no wind left in me.