Cotton and Corn

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1. Corn and Catholics “What! still those two infernal questions, That with our meals our slumbers mix That spoil our tempers and digestions Eternal Corn and Catholics! Gods! were there ever two such bores? Nothing else talk’d of night or morn Nothing in doors, or out of doors, But endless Catholics and Corn! Never was such a brace of […]...
2. November Cotton Flower Boll-weevil’s coming, and the winter’s cold, Made cotton-stalks look rusty, seasons old, And cotton, scarce as any southern snow, Was vanishing; the branch, so pinched and slow, Failed in its function as the autumn rake; Drouth fighting soil had caused the soil to take All water from the streams; dead birds were found In wells […]...
3. Laughing Corn THERE was a high majestic fooling Day before yesterday in the yellow corn. And day after to-morrow in the yellow corn There will be high majestic fooling. The ears ripen in late summer And come on with a conquering laughter, Come on with a high and conquering laughter. The long-tailed blackbirds are hoarse. One of […]...
4. The Waving Of The Corn Ploughman, whose gnarly hand yet kindly wheeled Thy plough to ring this solitary tree With clover, whose round plat, reserved a-field, In cool green radius twice my length may be Scanting the corn thy furrows else might yield, To pleasure August, bees, fair thoughts, and me, That here come oft together daily I, Stretched prone […]...
5. Memorial Tablet Squire nagged and bullied till I went to fight, (Under Lord Derby’s Scheme). I died in hell – (They called it Passchendaele). My wound was slight, And I was hobbling back; and then a shell Burst slick upon the duck-boards: so I fell Into the bottomless mud, and lost the light. At sermon-time, while Squire […]...
6. Corn Hut Talk WRITE your wishes on the door and come in. Stand outside in the pools of the harvest moon. Bring in the handshake of the pumpkins. There’s a wish for every hazel nut? There’s a hope for every corn shock? There’s a kiss for every clumsy climbing shadow? Clover and the bumblebees once, High winds and […]...
7. Cotton Song Come, brother, come. Lets lift it; Come now, hewit! roll away! Shackles fall upon the Judgment Day But lets not wait for it. God’s body’s got a soul, Bodies like to roll the soul, Cant blame God if we dont roll, Come, brother, roll, roll! Cotton bales are the fleecy way, Weary sinner’s bare feet […]...
8. Corn To-day the woods are trembling through and through With shimmering forms, that flash before my view, Then melt in green as dawn-stars melt in blue. The leaves that wave against my cheek caress Like women’s hands; the embracing boughs express A subtlety of mighty tenderness; The copse-depths into little noises start, That sound anon like […]...
9. There is a June when Corn is cut There is a June when Corn is cut And Roses in the Seed A Summer briefer than the first But tenderer indeed As should a Face supposed the Grave’s Emerge a single Noon In the Vermilion that it wore Affect us, and return Two Seasons, it is said, exist The Summer of the Just, And […]...
10. Your Hay It Is Mow'd, And Your Corn Is Reap'd (Comus.) Your hay it is mow’d, and your corn is reap’d; Your barns will be full, and your hovels heap’d: Come, my boys, come; Come, my boys, come; And merrily roar out Harvest Home. (Chorus.) Come, my boys, come; Come, my boys, come; And merrily roar out Harvest Home. (Man.) We ha’ cheated the parson, […]...
11. Jones's Porvate Argyment That air same Jones, which lived in Jones, He had this pint about him: He’d swear with a hundred sighs and groans, That farmers MUST stop gittin’ loans, And git along without ’em: That bankers, warehousemen, and sich Was fatt’nin’ on the planter, And Tennessy was rotten-rich A-raisin’ meat and corn, all which Draw’d money […]...
12. Accidents The barber has accidentally taken off an ear. It lies like Something newborn on the floor in a nest of hair. Oops, says the barber, but it musn’t’ve been a very good Ear, it came off with very little complaint. It wasn’t, says the customer, it was always overly waxed. I tried putting a wick […]...
13. Ode to the Goddess Ceres Dear Goddess of Corn, whom the ancients we know, (Among other odd whims of those comical bodies,) Adorn’d with somniferous poppies, to show, Thou wert always a true Country-gentleman’s Goddess. Behold in his best, shooting-jacket, before thee, An eloquent ‘Squire, who most humbly beseeches, Great Queen of the Mark-lane (if the thing doesn’t bore thee), […]...
14. To His Honoured and Most Ingenious Friend Mr. Charles Cotton For brave comportment, wit without offence, Words fully flowing, yet of influence: Thou art that man of men, the man alone, Worthy the public admiration: Who with thine own eyes read’st what we do write, And giv’st our numbers euphony, and weight. Tell’st when a verse springs high, how understood To be, or not born […]...
15. On The Death Of Sir Rowland Cotton Seconding That Of Sir Robert More Cottons yet? O let not envious Fate Attempt the Ruine of our growing State. O had it spar’d Sir Rowland, then might wee Have almost spar’d Sir Robert’s Library. His Life and th’ others bookes taught but the same; Death kils us twice in blotting twice one Name. Give Him, and take those Reliques […]...
16. Corn Grinders O little mouse, why dost thou cry While merry stars laugh in the sky? Alas! alas! my lord is dead! Ah, who will ease my bitter pain? He went to seek a millet-grain In the rich farmer’s granary shed; They caught him in a baited snare, And slew my lover unaware: Alas! alas! my lord […]...
17. Remembrances Of The Renowned Knight, Sir Rowland Cotton, Of Bellaport In Shropshire, Concerning Renowned Champion full of wrestling Art, And made for victory in every part, Whose active Limbes, oyl’d Tongue, and vertuous Mind, Subdu’d both Foe and Friend, the Rough and Kind, Yea, ev’n Thy-selfe, and thy Diseases too, And all but Death (which won with much adoe And shall at last be vanquish’d,) where are now […]...
18. Parlez-Vous Francais? Caesar, the amplifier voice, announces Crime and reparation. In the barber shop Recumbent men attend, while absently The barber doffs the naked face with cream. Caesar proposes, Caesar promises Pride, justice, and the sun Brilliant and strong on everyone, Speeding one hundred miles an hour across the land: Caesar declares the will. The barber firmly […]...
19. Love Without Hope Love without hope, as when the young bird-catcher Swept off his tall hat to the Squire’s own daughter, So let the imprisoned larks escape and fly Singing about her head, as she rode by....
20. Thar's More In the Man Than Thar Is In The Land I knowed a man, which he lived in Jones, Which Jones is a county of red hills and stones, And he lived pretty much by gittin’ of loans, And his mules was nuthin’ but skin and bones, And his hogs was flat as his corn-bread pones, And he had ’bout a thousand acres o’ land. […]...
21. A Dream Of Death I dreamed that one had died in a strange place Near no accustomed hand, And they had nailed the boards above her face, The peasants of that land, Wondering to lay her in that solitude, And raised above her mound A cross they had made out of two bits of wood, And planted cypress round; […]...
22. Panels THE WEST window is a panel of marching onions. Five new lilacs nod to the wind and fence boards. The rain dry fence boards, the stained knot holes, heliograph a peace. (How long ago the knee drifts here and a blizzard howling at the knot holes, whistling winter war drums?)...
23. Sonnet XLVIII: Cupid, I Hate Thee Cupid, I hate thee, which I’d have thee know; A naked starveling ever may’st thou be. Poor rogue, go pawn thy fascia and thy bow For some few rags wherewith to cover thee. Or, if thou’lt not, thy archery forbear, To some base rustic do thyself prefer, And when corn’s sown or grown into the […]...
24. Joe Ramsbottom Joe Ramshottom rented a bit of a farm From its owner, Squire Goslett his name; And the Gosletts came over with William the First, And found Ramsbottoms here when they came. One day Joe were ploughing his three-acre field When the front of his plough hit a rock, And on closer inspection o’ t’ damage […]...
25. How Much More Blood? How much more blood Must the people suffer Before they come to a halt With this horror of power? How many more lives Do we have to proffer ’till cloyed they are forever With terror manufacture? (November 1998)...
26. Friends Beyond WILLIAM Dewy, Tranter Reuben, Farmer Ledlow late at plough, Robert’s kin, and John’s, and Ned’s, And the Squire, and Lady Susan, lie in Mellstock churchyard now! “Gone,” I call them, gone for good, that group of local hearts and Heads; Yet at mothy curfew-tide, And at midnight when the noon-heat breathes it back from walls […]...
27. 260. Sketch in Verse, inscribed to the Right Hon. C. J. Fox HOW wisdom and Folly meet, mix, and unite, How Virtue and Vice blend their black and their white, How Genius, th’ illustrious father of fiction, Confounds rule and law, reconciles contradiction, I sing: If these mortals, the critics, should bustle, I care not, not I-let the Critics go whistle! But now for a Patron whose […]...
28. Interior IN the cool of the night time The clocks pick off the points And the mainsprings loosen. They will need winding. One of these days… they will need winding. Rabelais in red boards, Walt Whitman in green, Hugo in ten-cent paper covers, Here they stand on shelves In the cool of the night time And […]...
29. Portrait (For S. A.)TO write one book in five years Or five books in one year, To be the painter and the thing painted, … where are we, bo? Wait-get his number. The barber shop handling is here And the tweeds, the cheviot, the Scotch Mist, And the flame orange scarf. Yet there is more-he sleeps […]...
30. The Late Sir John Ogilvy Alas! Sir John Ogilvy is dead, aged eighty-seven, But I hope his soul is now in heaven; For he was a generous-hearted gentleman I am sure, And, in particular, very kind unto the poor. He was a Christian gentleman in every degree, And, for many years, was an M. P. for Bonnie Dundee, And, while […]...
31. Calamity in London ‘Twas in the year of 1897, and on the night of Christmas day, That ten persons’ lives were taken sway, By a destructive fire in London, at No. 9 Dixie Street, Alas! so great was the fire, the victims couldn’t retreat. In Dixie Street, No. 9, if was occupied by two families, Who were all […]...
32. Procreation It hurts my pride that I should be The issue of a night of lust; Yet even Bishops, you’ll agree, Obey the biologic ‘must’; Though no doubt with more dignity Than we of layman dust. I think the Lord made a mistake When he designed the human race, That man and angel in the make […]...
33. The Man from Iron Bark It was the man from Ironbark who struck the Sydney town, He wandered over street and park, he wandered up and down. He loitered here he loitered there, till he was like to drop, Until at last in sheer despair he sought a barber’s shop. “Ere! shave my beard and whiskers off, I’ll be a […]...
34. Hymn 121 Children devoted to God. [For those who practise infant Baptism.] Gen. 17:7,10; Acts 16:14,15,33. Thus saith the mercy of the Lord, “I’ll be a God to thee; I’ll bless thy num’rous race, and they Shall be a seed for me.” Abram believed the promised grace, And gave his sons to God; But water seals the […]...
35. Summer Dawn Pray but one prayer for me ‘twixt thy closed lips, Think but one thought of me up in the stars. The summer night waneth, the morning light slips, Faint and grey ‘twixt the leaves of the aspen, betwixt the cloud-bars That are patiently waiting there for the dawn: Patient and colourless, though Heaven’s gold Waits […]...
36. Dumb Swede With barbwire hooch they filled him full, Till he was drunker than all hell, And then they peddled him the bull About a claim they had to sell. A thousand bucks they made him pay, Knowing that he had nothing more, And when he begged it back next day, And wept! – they kicked him […]...
37. Peace after a Storm When darkness long has veil’d my mind, And smiling day once more appears, Then, my Redeemer, then I find The folly of my doubts and fears. Straight I upbraid my wandering heart, And blush that I should ever be Thus prone to act so base a part, Or harbour one hard thought of Thee! Oh! […]...
38. A Nervous Governor-General We read in the press that Lord Northcote is here To take up Lord Tennyson’s mission. ‘Tis pleasant to find they have sent us a Peer, And a man of exalted position. It’s his business to see that the Radical horde From loyalty’s path does not swerve us; But his tastes, and the task, don’t […]...
39. TEXTURES The grain of the exposed boards Speaks through the wall of the years We are back in our cottage On the wind-swathed hills Watching late winter dawns Gather like kindled flame. We are back with those winter dusks, – The hyaline air hung in darkness And a vale of stars, waking in blankets Laid on […]...
40. In The Poppy Field Mad Patsy said, he said to me, That every morning he could see An angel walking on the sky; Across the sunny skies of morn He threw great handfuls far and nigh Of poppy seed among the corn; And then, he said, the angels run To see the poppies in the sun. A poppy is […]...