SLOW FARMERS by Eliza Woods
Slow Farmers
For Sasha, the “Hose Guy” to my “Coach Daddy” on Hocus Pocus Farm
somebody stuck a broken sign in the hollow stump
at the end of the short dirt driveway that led to our farm
SLOW
FARMERS
it read in all-caps
like someone speaking a bit too loudly
it must have faced the road once
where its message would have been fully visible
unblocked by the stump
“Slow Farmers At Work”
a warning to the luxury vehicles
careening down the scenic narrow roadway
but now the sign faced us
leering jauntily from its craggy wooden pedestal
as we bent and stooped and kneeled and carried
among our many rows of vegetables
SLOW
FARMERS
on certain days it felt like a taunt
a reminder that we would never finish
that the lists would have to be written again
then rewritten and changed and reordered
that we would fall behind the field and crop plans
so carefully laid out and deliberated over all winter
that we would never outpace the weeds
or the flea beetles or the heat or the drought
that even the longest days of summer
did not hold enough hours
but there were other days
days when the sign shimmered with new meaning
SLOW
FARMERS
like a phrase lifted from some great haiku poet or mystic
some ancient text connecting us to the flow of life
and I would repeat it to myself as I worked
weeding and harvesting and humming a slow farmer song
and remember to look closely at the coiled tendrils of the peas
the shining eggplants jumping into my bin like fish
and pause when I found a snakeskin under a tarp
to hold its translucent eyes up to my own
Poet Bio
Eliza Woods
(they/them)
Eliza Woods is a trans/nonbinary anti-Zionist Jewish artist, writer, educator, vegetable farmer, and organizer. They live in Brooklyn, NY on the lands of Lenapehoking.
