Down by the orchard plot a man and boy,
The boy’s hat just above the whitened floor
Of oats half hiding the young trees and swaying
Under a strong breeze in the blazing noon.
The man looks upward, blinks with dazzled eyes,
The shading face with hand peers painfully;
Little winged creatures drive athwart the sun,
High up, in ceaseless, countless flight to the north.
His mood runs hot envisioning the past.
It was three years ago this very day.
Three years ago that clinging, hopping horde
Made the earth crawl. With slobbery mouths,
All leafage, woody twig, and grain, and grass,
They utterly consumed, leaving the land
Abominable. The wind-borne plague rained down
On the full-leaved tree where laughter rippled light
To answer odorous whispers of the flowers,
Soon, naked to the blistering sun, it stared
At the bones of its piteous comrades. Afterwards,
A jest to strangers-charity-cattle hungering-
Women and children starving! But the power of creatures!
The daughters of the locust, numberless, numberless!
Jaws bite, throats suck, the beauty of lovely fields
Is in their guts, the world is but a mummy!
Man and boy turn from the oats and the vigorous orchard;
But as they go the lad is looking, looking
To see, high up, like gnats, the winged millions
Moving across the sun. May God rebuke them.
(Edwin Ford Piper)
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Based on Topics: Man Poems, World Poems, Youth Poems, Flowers Poems, Beauty Poems, Past Poems, Power Poems, Daughters PoemsBased on Keywords: hopping, blistering, leafage, wind-borne, full-leaved, envisioning