ARTSPEAK! 2016: Poem #14 "Harvest"

Welcome to day 14 of my National Poetry Month poem-a-day-project ARTSPEAK! in which I respond to images found in the online collections at the National Gallery of Art. Please join me, if you feel so inspired! 

But first, please visit Jone at DeoWriter to see how our Progressive Poem is progressing!

This year's ARTSPEAK! theme is "Plant. Grow Eat." It was inspired by the release of my latest book FRESH DELICIOUS: Poems from the Farmers' Market.

Here are the poems so far:

"Anticipation (in the Garden) after George Moore in the Artist's Garden by Edouard Manet
"Gathering Fruit" after Gathering Fruit by Mary Cassatt
"Bread's Lament" after Boy with Basket of Fruit by an unknown American artist
"After the Fire" after Ruined Farm by Hubert Robert
"Cow at the Gate" after Landscape with Open Gate by Pieter Molijin
"I Am the Plate" after Still Life with Milk Jug and Fruit by Paul Cezanne
"Courtship (According to the Cat)" by Winslow Homer
"Courage" after Planting Corn by Stanley Mazur
"Orchard Barber Shop" after Gardener Pruning a Tree by Jacques Callot
"Gardener's Companion" after The Watering Can by Georges Seurat

"Man, Reading" after Denoisel Reading in the Garden by James Tissot

"At the Vegetable Market" after Vegetable Market at Pontoise by Camille Pissarro

"Triolet for Planting Day" after The Artist's Garden at Eragny by Camille Pissarro

I selected today's piece The Last Days of Harvest by Winslow Homer because it's what our gentleman in yesterday's poem was yearning for.... the fruits of labor! But it isn't that simple, is it? The harvest takes work, too, as these boys are well aware.

Harvest

While our fathers

pluck pumpkins

we shuck

and shuck

and shuck.

With a little

luck

we'll be done

in time

for lunch.

Meanwhile

the corn sings:

rustle, crinkle,

crunch.

- Irene Latham

Listen to the poem on Soundcloud.