Harvest Time

Song of the Harvesters
  (By R. E. Form)

The long and sultry days have come,
  And June's bright sun is o'er us,
So we have left our homes and gone,
   To meet the field before us.

Not to the field of war and strife,
   Not to the field of longing;
But to the ripened field of grain
   We harvesters are thronging.

We meet no scenes of horror there,
   We drench no soil with blood,
And yet we do a nobler work,
   In doing what is good.

We blot no country's name with shame,
   We curse no woman's tears,
We fill no graves with human forms,
   No mothers' hearts with fears.

We do the work which God designed
   And gather Nature's yield;
We bind in sheaves the golden grain
   On many a harvest field.

And when the Winter's snow shall come,
   So we can reap no more,
We are busy beating out the grain
   Upon the threshing floor.

And many the mills that grind our grain,
   And many and many an hour
Shall the soft white hands of mother
   Knead into bread the flour.

And many a tongue shall bless it
   When evening prayer is said;
And many a heart feel thankful
   For our loaves of wheaten bread."
   (West Grove, June 21, 1880)

After a dry summer, just as the farmers were ready to harvest, the rains came. October was the 4th wettest on record with two times the normal rainfall. It has made this harvest season the second latest after 2009's wet October. 


I had to wait awhile to get the picture I wanted with the red/gold of the leaves, the white of the grasses and fence, the blue sky and the red combine at just the right spot. Bud joked that I was out there telling the harvester, "Stop there. No. Back up. No. Go ahead a bit."