Poem: We’re promised the harvest.

Built on Cotton, 2020 by LaShawnda Jones Part of the Juneteenth 2022 Print Series

The harvest is enough.

We’re each gifted seeds without limit.
Provided abundant sunlight, water, dirt.
We conserve energy, increase yields
with observation, practice, planning.
Are you paying attention?
Do you know your cycles, seasons, patterns?
Do you shift in times of dormancy,
growth, gathering, distribution?
Alternate crops to enhance offerings?
Give thanks for blessings
pulled from the ground?
What words do you speak into
your heart, mind, spirit as you till?
Do you encourage your hands,
feet, back through the labor?
Whatever seeds we sow,
labor is required to
reap a promised harvest.

Are you planting purposefully?
Are you cultivating with vision?
Are you harvesting in joy?

Life is the reciprocal value
equation of time to harvest
and harvest to time.
To sow in tears and reap in joy
is the endnote to a life well lived.

Those who go out weeping,
    bearing the seed for sowing,
shall come home with shouts of joy,
    carrying their sheaves.
~ Psalm 126:6

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