Best Making Hay Poems
Blue sky, glorious golden sunshine
Elements every farmer needs.
With crops rippling in the breeze
Combine harvesters whirl into action
See them steadfastly snaking along the fields
I can hear their dull drone from morning to night
Farmhands work tirelessly to gather the harvest
Making hay whilst the sun shines
Every second of the day is so precious
Until the final rays of the red sunset fade
Only then the farmer leaves and can rest
Harvest moon rapidly rises
Silhouetted in the majestic oak tree
A barn owl roosts silently in the quiet of night
Nature Poem – Sponsor Shadow Hamilton
08~02~15
Was self-employed for thirty-five years
So when I finally called it quits
No big party, no expensive gold watch
No well wishers, no funny quips
As I quietly sailed off into the sunset
I heard this young fellow say
“Another piece of deadwood we're rid of!
Let's go, it's a brand new day”
That's funny, I said the very same thing
He's right, it's a brand new day
No more stress no ridiculous deadlines
Finally time for making hay
Young whipper snappers have no idea
Their time will come sure as rain
“Another piece of deadwood we're rid of!”
It'll be they who'll hear that refrain!
© Jack Ellison 2013
Making Hay
by
Kevin Fairbrother
…
Gradually winter fades, spring has begun
The ground will warm up, the grass will grow
The winter rains, the spring sunshine, now for summer
This will make the grass grow and grow
…
The hot days with storms and rain
The grass is getting longer every day
Time to prepare the mower and hay rake
And make sure the baler is in ship shape
…
Plenty of grease in all moving places
The knives sharpened, bolts replaced
Machinery is ready for the harvest
Come December and hot dry weather
…
The disc mower attached to the tractor
Whirs into action to mow down the grass
Cutting the grass close to the ground, lays it flat
In the 10 acre paddock on the river flat
…
The paddock all cut in neat flat rows
Will need lots of sunshine to dry it out
A couple of warm hot days be ready to turn
Once turned another day be ready to bale
…
The baler hooked up begins to thump
As the pick-up feeds in the dry grass
The needle whirs and threads the string
The first bale rolls off the machine
…
Hour after hour the baler spits out bales
Soon the paddock is filled with square bales
The men move in with the flat tray truck
Load the bales with sweat and strength
…
The bales carted and under cover
The hay making machines now quite
The men gather around for a beer and a feed
The hay making done for another year
Sofia the large sandy crab
Afraid of a life too drab
Took to the sea
With her cousin Kong Kee
And a six spotted floundering dab
Oh Kong Kee now this is the life
No worries no trouble no strife
Shoulda done this before
She got hit by an oar
And that was the end of her life
The dab and Kong Kee carried on
To finish their cousins swansong
The smell of fishrot
In a new fangled pot
Was the end for the cousin called Kong
Now the dab swims alone in the bay
While the sun shines he's still making hay
For he's back whence he went
Pocket money all spent
And so happily, blissfully gay
Dab met a small fish on the way
Who aspired to become a great ray
He ate as he must
Til his belly did bust
And he ends up as soup o' the day
There's a moral in each little story
So never go hunting for glory
You'll end up on a plate
Tryin' to mimic a skate
When you're really a small johnny dory
Oh, I sit upon my porch, just to get a bit of breeze,
On the north side of my house, under over-hanging trees.
I feel so contented here, with my good dog at my feet.
At my age it takes so little, to make a life complete.
Dear ones have gone before, and will meet me at the shore
When I leave this earthly home and don't need it any more.
For now my work is over, I can rest this sumer day
And feel pity for my neighbor in the meadow making hay.
The breeze is growing cooler, and the dog is getting bored.
I'll soon be in my bedoom just a chatting with the Lord.
I was a busy fellow and I worked hard all my life
I rased some boys and girls and I had a darling wife.
I saved a little money and I sometimes go to see
My children who have settled in the west aways from me.
I am always glad to get back to my little valley home.
The older that I get the less inclined I am to roam.
So I sit upon my porch, just to get a bit of breeze,
On the north side of my house, under over-hanging trees.
I reckon there's no other fellow more content than I
In my small home in the valley, where I'll stay until I die.
By: Joyce Johnson 2007
Sadly I heard this old man say one day
If I had his looks I'd be out there making hay
In the sunshine or the rain
On the grass, or on a plane
Guess I'll just have to perform a solo ballet
© Jack Ellison 2015
Make hay while the sun shines.
I grew up as a closeted polypathic nature-mystic
on a marginal, at best, family farm
in Michigan.
This farm was my embryonic home,
an extension of my vastly loved and nurturing Mother,
more than my workaholic homophobic Father,
who most emphatically did create a patriarchal god in his own image.
His farm was for slave labor.
Her farm was a garden for growing healthy wealth.
I loved Mom's Multi-ReGenerational Family Farm
like an extension of my ego's mind and body.
And, like a turtle without a shell,
when I first headed off to Ann Arbor's University
I brought my happy and healthy ego with me,
eager to begin my new adventure story,
yet I emotionally stumbled,
felt naked and exposed and depressed,
for lack of my embryonic habitus,
my eco-center,
my home,
my interdependently embracing love of sacred spaces
and their seasons of regeneration and degeneration,
growing still and fading without ego me
conjoining.
I was homesick,
but not for Nurturing Nanny
and Fearsome Father
or even Perfect Princess Sister, whom I cherished,
whom I could talk and listen with as whim might invite,
and, although somewhat more of a sore detachment from our farmhouse interior spaces,
my disorienting alienation from Ann Arbor
was as a too-urban outside place
just as my recreating resident embrace
favored my dorm and classroom youth-learning multicultural race
against more oppressive monoculturing times.
To this day,
despite a six week backpacking hike
along California's Pacific Coast Trail,
plundered by surreal vistas and fragrance and light and unspeakable beauty,
when I imagine a meadow, a field, a woodland,
a pond,
a barn,
an unpaved road,
a gravel drive,
a herd of cattle,
a pen of pigs,
a coop of chickens,
a litter of kittens with eyes still sealed shut,
I recall iconic scenes from this sacred originating home,
my eco-memory
calling my doubly-bound ego-enculturing self
back home
to where we permaculturally began together,
making hay while the sun did shine.
The moment I am out of the box
Foxes and hyenas surround me
Needy greedy aggressive seekers
Those who even a second before
Lay hidden in hibernation
In the tightly closed boxes of steel
On the verge of elimination
Thanks to the cultural policing
Now pouncing for dark and dense satisfaction
In a paleolithic plunder
Quenching reddening hunger
In the black and brown forest
Of unchained unrest
In pursuance of almost unconquerable
And incorruptible pleasure principle
Of animal happiness
Night and day
Sense buds making hay
Out of the aesthetic box
Wreaking senseless havoc
Our rose and rhododendrons in decay
Our seagulls
In infirmary and hospitals
Out of the box
The Spanish bull and ox
Flummox our poems
Into the imagery of
Ingrained instancy
For our tumultuous ascendancy
On the pinnacle
Of crimson churning
And the giant jingling
Tapering off to
The momentary Nirvana
Of the
Intense distraction
That arose out of the box
A moment later
In an inertia again
Of the restless vein
For the overwhelming rain
Into deep brain
Teeming with craving lanes and bye lanes
In the dim light delight
Out of box
The red fox
No mailbox
No riverine knocks
The box is very important
For our civilization
Into the flowers
Of sunny sublimation
_______________________________________________
18/01/2017
For the contest, How Long Can A Poetry Go,
Sponsor, Jamie Pan
Note: As the metaphors in the poem is too obvious to need explanation, no writer’s
Statement is added here, as asked for by the sponsor except saying that it deals with the psychological process of the dominance of pleasure principles at the cost of reality principles as elucidated by Sigmund Freud.
Under The Ducky Moon
The Winter had been Harsh, Harsher than Most. Now cabin fever had taken its toll.
I was beginning to act a little bit weird, but so were others I know.
Then suddenly the sun revealed itself, its warmth was beginning to show.
Ice began to melt from the chair in my back yard, and yes it tempted me so…
And then I snapped, its true, I know, with the melting of ice and snow.
With every single drip… drip… drip… my mind began to go…
I’d been stubborn and frozen to the core on many a winter’s day.
As I had stayed by the window, while I’d typed my poems away.
I had counted every icy day… toward those beautiful blessed Spring Rays…
Then one day the temperature went from 8 to 78, and that took my breath away…
I threw off the blankets that kept me warm and I danced…a lot I say!
No matter how crazy it looked… I’d enjoy the January thaw, making hay!
It’d soon be winter again, so I ran outside and chiseled the ice from that chair.
Then in defiance I sat there as my dog slid over sheets of ice with flare.
To our neighbors we must have looked crazy, like we didn’t have a clue.
But they quickly turned back, to chiseling ice from their driveways anew.
But my dog and I continued to stay disposed quite nice.
After all there was only 4 inches of deep blue ice.
Yep, I sat there and watched as water began streaming down the street so
precise…
I continued to sit there until I saw that the full moon had finally come out.
Then I began to wonder if perhaps we should beware of the nutty people running
about…
As if!!! I answered. The Full moon’s got nothing on cabin fever. No doubt!
I continued to watch until some ducks peacefully flew across the full moon that
night…
At that point, I knew my choice had been absolutely truly right…
For the cold would come back, and I’d always remember my choice…
This day would Forever be the day, when the Ducky Moon brought this story to
voice.
Certainly worked my bum off today
Creating a 40 page magazine, still making hay
You'd think I've had enough
Of this graphic design stuff
But it keeps me alive and the grey clouds away
© Jack Ellison 2015
Under the Texas stars,
far away from the cars...
I see them twinkling so bright.
I thought about You and I,
what we said that night...
as I held you tight.
You told Me, You'd be true,
I said I'd never leave You...
under those bright Texas stars.
We are in love,
I'm your man...
and you're my little dove.
I thought about You today,
while making hay...
and know we'll be O.K.
Think I'll see You tonight,
and hold You tight...
under these bright Texas stars.
So I pull on my boots and hat,
can't wait til we chat...
gettin' slick for my gal.
You look like an angel,
dancing the two step...
till the music fades under those Texas stars.
By Perri Voge Texan Cowboy 2007
There's a place down California way
Where I once perchance did stay
In a tent
with cheap rent
Next to the trains making hay
Whilst cimbing the grade to Las Vegas
And beyond that land of lost wages.
With city goods.
"Must buy" shoulds.
(The marketing cry for all ages.)
To say Nipton, the town, was a ghost,
Would surely not be a boast.
Nipton needed a boost,
Not unlike getting goosed,
Or Nipton soon would be toast.
Enter the much-maligned weed,
Some folks hate and some need.
Cannabis.
Hit 'n miss,
But good to the very last seed.
The little old town of Nipton
Is now in a leveraged position.
Bought by a Pot
Company who ought
Make a fortune from its acquisition.
Los Angeles is just down the hill.
Uphill's the city of thrills,
(Where what happens stays,
While unleashed people plays)
Will folks zero in for the kill?
On Nipton, the once defunct town,
Now wearing the "smoke-it-here' gown?
Get high here!
Never fear.
Marijuana's now legal, don't frown.
Btw, if you choose to partake,
And a trip to Nipton you take,
Bring some ear plugs.
Those choo-chooey chugs
Will give you a major headache.
A musing Mary, quite stationary
sitting with her laptop so still
thinks of limo cars, Broadway stars
and her dream house on the hill
Jill and Jack laid in their sack
wondering about Mary on their hill
making hay about "will she stay?"
tip their bucket to make it spill
Georgie Porgie and the water supply
got fresh with Mary, then up and went dry
and the big bad wolf ate Grandma away
George as the wolf, sang Broadway cabaret
Little Miss Muffet and Little Jack Horner
hawked wares on a New York street corner
pies, curds and whey, discounted all day
and Little Muffet did, a magic trick play
friends Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee
hired a blind mouse to make it three
sang sidewalk duets, with the mouse rapping
shoes clicking softly and tiny cane tapping
Old Mother Goose, a Times Square recluse
did Father Gander's paycheck squander
on baubles and bling and trivial things
why she needed all that stuff I wonder
Ol' King Cole, his kingdom in a hole
decided to further leverage his coffers
with bonds of junk and dollars that shrunk
he's in Cayman Islands awaiting better offers
ganders and gooses are on the looses
and Ol' Cole and Mary and Jill and Jack
are off on a vacation and won't come back
still common rhymes hafta work over time
© Goode Guy 2011-10-10
IF YOU PULL A LONG FACE : Part XXXV
IF you pull a long croquet face
While picking your teeth index and thumb over molar
Canines will drip corrosive acids on knuckles and nails
E'en if you lose anonymous self in a crowded alley
If you pull a long twisted itching face
All through childhood while making hay
You risk being stung by bluebottles and fleas
Right where you may not much like 'em to stay
If you pull a long self-conscious face
Guilt straining your under-your-wear during play
Tell-tale signs beyond control those stains on lace
Parents by Law only keep teens so long as they obey
If you pull a long pre-maturé face
E'en a Mahatma Gandhi married at puberté
At 36 assumes Brahmacharya celibate sacrifice
To libido's extra-marital experience falls prey
If you must pull a long pedo-de-filed priestly face
Pull it not on homeless orphan or pious nun gone astray
Tussle all alone the Devil in you from pantry to pillow-case
Or else the Man in Hu-Man would drive the Wo-Man gay
© T. Wignesan - Paris, February 21, 2019
Haven't got time for those cynical people
They're never gonna drag me down
Life's too short for whining and complaining
In their own negativity they drown
For twenty-four seven it's non-stop paranoia
Can't imagine living that way
On the sunniest day their sun doesn't shine
I rather spend time making hay
Suspecting the government's watching us
Taping us each time we pee
Had no idea things had gotten that serious
Why such interest in little old me
Well I'm just gonna go on my merry old way
More important things on my mind
Like feeding Dufus and my persian cat Lily
A good way to stay sane I find
Haven't got time for those cynical people
There's exciting stuff to explore
This friendly old planet is beckoning me
So I'm off to open more doors
© Jack Ellison 2013