The Red Land

Professor Emeritus Joseph Warren Beach

In the autumn,
Bathed in gold-dust,
I shall strip the red land
Of a golden harvest.
 Oh, fruitful as the red land
Bearing golden harvest
In the autumn,
Bountiful as the prairie
Heaving milky breasts
On flushed horizons!
  My hand slackens
In the act of cutting,
While I lose myself
In these blue distances.
 The scythe pauses
On the neck of the wheat
As my heart faints against
These flushed horizons.
  I that have seen the sky,
In the time of reaping,
Between her breasts
In the wheat-field,
Sowing and reaping,
There I worship
The land! Joseph Warren Beach