Sign-Directed

I was born under the sign
of the threshing machine
and lived by its portent.
The meaning of the hot August
day when I entered this world
stays with me even in
coldest January. I move
in the sweat and dust of the work,
hearing the engine whirl
the cylinder, shake the sieves,
turn the auger as belts slap
and clack and pulleys spin.
I haul in my crop to
separate wheat from the chaff,
closed in the zodiac of
a hot August morning while
Leo roars among the stars.