in drought-stricken lawns

in drought-stricken lawns

untouched by mowers, hardy 

wildflowers blossom

Here in Iowa the high heat index warnings and drought continue, the worst since 1988. Field corn is starting to dry from the ground up, bad news for farmers.
          Grass has turned brown and brittle, so folks who routinely scalp their lawns every week have stopped mowing. Ironically, this has given hardy wildflowers like Queen Anne's Lace, bird's foot trefoil and cornflower a chance to spring up in places where they would usually be cut down. Looking like stars winking on at twilight, they blossom in profusion despite the lack of moisture.
          I'm playing a rain raga every day and turning over my Peruvian cactus rain stick to make that lovely sound of falling rain, but so far we've only gotten a tantalizing sprinkle, just enough to make splotches on the dusty cars.

checkerboard rows

checkerboard rows

of purple, blue and yellow 

plums in blue boxes

Saturday at the farmer's market. White tents shade produce and people. A band with a fiddle, guitar and bodhrán plays jigs and reels. Parents with kids, babes in bright red Radio Flyers, boys being boys, girls sitting and chatting, farmers weighing produce on scales. Each tent shelters the farm's specialty, many with free samples: potted or fresh cut flowers, plums in blue boxes, blueberries in plastic containers, crates of green beans, summer squash in cartons, bunches of carrots, beets and onions, heaps of corn on the cob, piles of tomatoes, jars of honey. All of the produce locally grown, fresh from farm to city.

between wind and rain

between wind and rain

farmers hurry to harvest

fields of corn and beans

Farmers have been working in the gap in weather, combining and harrowing between bouts of wind and rain, sometimes working all night. It's late afternoon on a perfect weather day. A farmer in a green John Deere combine is harvesting a cornfield, working his way from the outside in. The combine fells the stalks, scoops them up and sends them into the bowels of the machine, where the corn is separated from the stalks, leaves, husks and cobs. When it's full, the combine spews the golden kernels out of a long spout into a red BRENT hopper. The combine-to-hopper exchange happens with both rigs moving side-by-side, the combine still combining and the white CASE tractor with the attached hopper keeping pace. When the hopper is full, the driver pulls alongside a red Ford grain dump truck and transfers the corn through the hopper's spout to the grain dump bed. When the dump truck is full, it moves off the field to transfer the corn to a silo. In a recently harvested field up the road, a yellow CAT tractor is turning up the dirt with a disc harrow, breaking up the dry remains of the soybean plants. The wind is starting to pick up, lifting twisted yellow corn leaves into the air. They hover above the corn tassels, then swoop down and scuttle along the road like something alive.

old red water pump

old red water pump

locked with a combination,

water repair lid 

rusted shut, puffy white clouds

hoarding their cargo

The drought continues. Corn stalks drying from the bottom up, the ears thin, drooping. In town, brittle brown grass, leaves on trees shriveled and brown. Walking around town, I notice that someone has attached a combination lock to an old red water pump on the side of a building. And on the brick sidewalk, the blue Mueller Water Repair Lid is rusted shut. Day after day, puffy white clouds pass by, little water tanks hoarding their precious cargo.