Autumn’s Treasure Underground (DHR)
Autumn chills among the hills
of potatoes on our prairie family farm.
Frosty fall mornings mean
today is potato harvest time
for my Ukrainian family.
Potatoes, like crunchy cabbage,
is a mainstay through the
long, dark winter nights.
Potatoes a main ingredient
in perogies, a dumpling filled
with this year’s potatoes
mashed and mixed with
homemade cottage cheese,
boiled, served with fried onions,
pork sausage from the summer
fattened pig, and brown butter.
So many calories and cholesterol
but we don’t worry. It is tradition.
It’s delicious.
First, potato tops are pulled
from the ground by hand. Wear
work gloves unless you want
green hands like the Hulk.
Then with garden fork, place
the tines strategically beside
each hill, push down firmly
with your worn work boots,
hopefully not spearing a potato.
Speared potatoes will rot
if stored over the prairie winter.
Instead, cooked today, sliced,
fried with bacon and butter
they are an early reward
for today’s hard labour.
You poke and poke again, turn
up the soil, until every last
earth nugget is discovered.
Let them dry in the autumn sun
then store your earthy treasures
till it is time to boil perogies,
simmer potato & cabbage soup,
serve mashed potatoes
with pork roast to celebrate...
that day in the garden,
summer’s harvest,
the joy of family together.
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