Fred C. Wootan
I had many interesting visits with Dwight over the past ten years. A more dedicated man to God and his life as a farmer I never met. I wrote the following poem for him and he enjoyed it very much:
The Farm
If ever a poem begs to be written
It begins in the place where I’m sittin’.
An overturned bucket I use for a seat
While this farm ages around my feet.
Death cannot come to such a place,
No matter how it appears on its face.
The harshest winter may bury it deep
Only to rise as springtime begins to peep.
Ancient equipment needed to work this farm
Seems to sit around succumbing to aging’s harm.
Looking closer will provide you a different message
Of grease and oil lovingly applied by this farm’s sage.
America founded with the greatest of intentions
By a people longing freedom from oppressions.
May we never forget those lofty goals,
Or throw our farms and country onto the shoals.
If this farm today appears to be in its last days,
This shallow thinking fails looking in other ways.
Depth reveals lushness of plants and trees galore,
With ages spread for two-hundred years and more.
But, let not a Roman Empire we become,
Nor a cynical non-farmer always on the run.
This old farm still offers a basic goodness.
Farming is the same as America’s purpose.
If you draw a line down the ends of the end-rhyming words and turn this poem on its left side, you will see the contour of this farm’s fields (Feb, 14, 2013, written by a friend)