photo credit: Nicholas_T
Through the ample open door of the peaceful country barn, A sun-lit pasture field, with cattle and horses feeding; And haze, and vista, and the far horizon, fading away.- Walt Whitman
Getting Back to the Farm
photo credit: kevindooley
The cost of beef and bacon is getting mighty high,
The price of eggs and butter is soaring to the sky,
Our milk is so expensive that we only take a gill
And lest we drink too much at once we suck it
through a quill.
photo credit: Tambako the Jaguar
The cost of living is a theme that claims attention
now,
It even seems to have the bulge on Europe’s family
row;
photo credit: Paco Espinoza
Our thoughts are turned from gas bombs and dirig-
ible balloons
While we ponder on the prospect of getting back to
prunes.
The men who guide the ship of state around the
shoals and wrecks
Are talking on the subject of causes and effects.
They seek to find the trouble and the remedy apply
That will keep the price of eatings from going up
so high.
photo credit: Atli Harðarson
They have juggled with statistics and performed a
little sum
And they tell us that production is completely on the
bum,
That the merchant and the banker and the printer
and the clerk
Must get out in the country and procure a job of
work.
photo credit: h.koppdelaney
They say the population now is drifting into town
And there must be some reaction to keep the prices
down;
Yea, from the hill and housetop they are spreading
the alarm,
That the way to save the nation is to get back to the
farm.
photo credit: Marianne Perdomo
Then farewell to the city with its glamor and its
strife,
I am going to seek some rural scene and lead the
simple life.
I want to be a farmer and with the farmer stand,
With hayseed in my whiskers and a pitchfork in my
hand.
photo credit: James Jordan
I will skiddoo back to nature and I’ll buy a span of
mules,
A husking peg and hayrake and other farming tools.
I will sow my fields in cabbage and when I thresh it
out
I will wreck the combination that controls our sour
krout.
photo credit: Per Ola Wiberg (Powi)
I will plant the tiny hayseed and raise a crop of hay
Perhaps I’ll keep a hen that lays a dozen eggs a day;
I’ll wipe the sweat from off my brow and bare my
strong right arm
And you’ll see the prices tumble when I get back
to the farm.
Albert Stroud – (Coffeyville, Kansas: The Journal Press. 1917)
If you would like to featured on Twilight Earth, and have outdoor nature photos that you would like to submit for our Photo Sunday Series, please Email Adam at TwilightEarth dot com.
Related posts:
{ 2 trackbacks }
{ 8 comments… read them below or add one }
Beautiful pics! This might be my favorite Photo Sunday yet!
Thank you Becky!
Loved the photos and Albert Stroud’s words. I couldn’t believe this was written in 1917, those words could’ve been written last week! I always look forward to Photo Sunday and, once again, was not disappointed!
Hi Wendy,
I was hoping that people would notice the irony of the poem. It just goes to show that even as early as the turn of the century, people knew that that we were not only linked with nature, but that to lose that link would bring personal and financial problems.
Thank you for your comment, and your compliment!
Adam
This was spectacular, Adam. While brevity is not my strong-suit, there’s nothing else I can say that sums up my reaction to your Photo Sunday more than this.
Spectacular.
CG
Thank you Christopher. I recently read that one of the reasons that we enjoy outdoor photography so much is because we spend so much time in our homes, cars and offices. Seeing scenes from nature, or a simpler time, helps relieve some of the unnatural pressure within our souls, that results from living lives that our bodies and minds were not originally meant to live.
I’m glad you enjoy, I sure do.
The thing about many of your Photo Sundays is this: You capture a feeling, not just a locale or concept. You make the viewer want to go there… Put another way, that’s the essence of great theatre. Having spent a quarter-century on stage, that’s what we do in a play. Making a person step into our world for two to three hours and make a journey with us.
Photo Sunday compels us, each week, to make the journey with you. You tell a story through pictures and words and it never fails to entertain and move us.
That’s not easy to do, and you do it on a weekly basis. Bravo.
CG
Thank you Christopher,
I always enjoy when you comment, because you treat me so well! -laugh- What would appear to be a quick article with 8 or 10 photo’s, actually turns into 3 hours of looking at hundreds of photos. But each one of the photos I pick, are by no means random. I really only choose the ones that “speak” to me through their color, texture, backgrounds… My wife (Hippy Chick) has an amazing eye for color, design and texture. (in both art and music. She is the talented one in the family) but she’s taught me to look past the obviouse to see the hidden beauty in things.
That’s why Photo Sunday is so cool. From small towns to farms, to bugs, bringing the reader (or viewer) into the story is both fun and a challenge. But then, you know this. This is what you’ve done with your audiences for more than 25 years.
Thanks Christopher,
Adam