Northern Harvest

Straw

colored grasses

gently ripple edges

of newly-mown fields.

Fully ripe and sun-laden,

golden stalks of grain lie flat

as far as the green-wooded fringe.

Push back the forest to rumpled, faded foothills,

rising misty, step by step, to distant, rugged peaks.

Summer snowmelt tumbled down -
rushing, nudging seeds to sprout.

As wobbly as newborn fawns,

soon spindly stems arose,

unfolding slowly,

 pushing through damp, dark, earth.

Neither late frost nor lingering heat defeated them,

roots reaching deep, leaves seeking sun.

Short season spent producing seed.

Gilded heads grew plump,

now freshly gleaned,

for winter’s

loaves.

“This is what the kingdom of God is like.

A man scatters seed on the ground.

 Night and day, whether he sleeps or gets up,

the seed sprouts and grows,

though he does not know how.

All by itself the soil produces grain -

 first the stalk, then the head,

then the full kernel in the head.

 As soon as the grain is ripe, he puts the sickle to it,

 because the harvest has come.”

Mark 4:26-29