The Pumpkin Field

Long ago, a girl and boy met walking through a pumpkin field. She laughed and ran, he dared to chase, and neither ever paused to yield. The boy was rich, and she was poor - for this they did not care. For what was fortune or the lack, when playtime be your fare? The year ran out and came again, and pumpkins grew once more. The boy and girl would meet and laugh and tell of local lore. Year on year the two would meet until they both grew tall. And one good year he stole kiss, sometime late in fall. “Marry me,” he said to her and her response was “yes.” She laughed and sang and didn’t mind she had nothing for a dress. The boy, once home was sat straight down and sternly told to choose. The girl he loved would ne’er be his, else his fortune he would lose. The proposition made him think, perhaps he had been wrong, And in the pumpkin field again, he made her wait so long. The girl, she had no gold or jewels – only love and faith, So, nothing mattered quite as much as that one handsome face. He kissed her long and then again, his passion cruel and bold, He told her then she’d ne’er be his - and left her in the cold. The next day dawned, the farmer farmed, and all seemed as before, Until he stumbled on some cloth and recognized the frozen form. Tears had hardened where they’d fallen, down her pretty cheeks, And her lovely lips so still and blue, never more would speak. The farmers anger grew and glistened, though he knew quite well, There’d be no justice for the girl, in this calloused dell. He took the pumpkin she had clutched and carved in it a look, A hellish laugh condemned the boy for the life he took. The boy, he saw the farmers gourd, and fear did strike his heart. He ran so fast he tripped at last and down a cliff he did depart. And every year that has gone by the villagers remember, And put their pumpkins at the door, within each gourd an ember. It flickers so, that every soul would know that good comes not To those that pray upon their lessers – comes only spoil and rot.