Digging

Between my finger and my thumb   
The squat pen rests; snug as a gun.

Under my window, a clean rasping sound   
When the spade sinks into gravelly ground:   
My father, digging. I look down
Till his straining rump among the flowerbeds   
Bends low, comes up twenty years away   
Stooping in rhythm through potato drills   
Where he was digging.
The coarse boot nestled on the lug, the shaft   
Against the inside knee was levered firmly.
He rooted out tall tops, buried the bright edge deep
To scatter new potatoes that we picked,
Loving their cool hardness in our hands.

By God, the old man could handle a spade.   
Just like his old man.
From Seamus Heaney's Digging

It's that time of year! Bright and beautiful, but very cold - I wrapped up warm and headed into the polytunnel for a bit of vigorous weeding and digging. No rasping sound for the digging was in peaty soil and no spuds yet but I suspect the straining rump was accurate. Tomorrow, if the weather holds, some compost from the bins will be applied, more digging and then broadbeans and salads will be ready to go. Daffs fully out, frogspawn on the pond (sadly frosted) and the song thrushes in full voice.
Franco was round to chainsaw the last of the big bits of wood from the trees that fell down in the storm some years ago. Himself was hard at it piling logs - enough to see us through the Spring and some for next year.

We might go to the cinema tonight to see Loving. Oscar nominated and the big excitement is that Ruth Negga is half Irish, the other half being a rather exotic Ethiopian! We were going to have a pizza first but the Brick Oven is jammed to the gills with Valentineing couples/families etc so it might be romantic fish and chips.