Massey, Ont. farmer shares poem in light of wet spring
By Kaitlynn Anderson
Farms.com
Strip grazing his Angus and Charolaise cattle isn’t the only skill cow-calf farmer Charlie Smith has. He also has a knack for poetry.
Charlie Smith
Smith contacted Andrea Gal, our managing editor, to share one of his poems.
He originally wrote the poem during a summer where it rained for daily for nearly a month. The previous summer was terribly dry.
With the wet summer much of the province is facing now, Smith thought it suiting to rework the piece. His poem is one that many farmers will relate to.
OVERCOMPENSATION (2)
I called for the rain, in anger and pain;
I scratched terrible runes in the dust.
I called to the moon, the gull and the loon...
Now everything’s mould, mud and rust.
My hay, last year stunted, is tall and uncut,
The pasture is getting ahead,
There are mushrooms galore in the gloom of my yard,
Fairy rings yellow and red.
There are big croaking frogs, that splash in the stream
(That I cynically still call my lane).
And the thunder god’s dance, given any good chance,
It’s drizzle, or downpour, then rain.
The haybine is hooked and it squats in the yard,
I’ve overhauled everything, twice.
I know we need rain, as we also need sun,
But a bit of dispersal’d be nice.
It’s been all summer wet after last summer’s drought –
I take the joke good as I can;
But I find myself shouting as new clouds roll up:
“Come down and fight like a man!”
Charlie Smith
Massey, Ontario