Assignment 14: Response to Joyce Sutphen

"Rural Farm" - Tom Brown

The Farm

JOYCE SUTPHEN

My father’s farm is an apple blossomer.

He keeps his hills in dandelion carpet

and weaves a lane of lilacs between the rose

and the jack-in-the-pulpits.

His sleek cows ripple in the pastures.

The dog and purple iris

keep watch at the garden’s end.

His farm is rolling thunder,

a lightning bolt on the horizon.

His crops suck rain from the sky

and swallow the smoldering sun.

His fields are oceans of heat,

where waves of gold

beat the burning shore.

A red fox

pauses under the birch trees,

a shadow is in the river’s bend.

When the hawk circles the land,

my father’s grainfields whirl beneath it.

Owls gather together to sing in his woods,

and the deer run his golden meadow.

My father’s farm is an icicle,

a hillside of white powder.

He parts the snowy sea,

and smooths away the valleys.

He cultivates his rows of starlight

and drags the crescent moon

through dark unfurrowed fields.

RESPONSE:

With the semester halfway over, I’ve been thinking of home and the places that mean most to me.  My grandparents live on a farm and it’s one of my favorite places in the world.  Therefore, I decided to respond to Joyce Sutphen’s “The Farm” this week.  I didn’t notice until the fourth verse that the poem mirrors the seasons and I thought this was a particularly nice touch.  Farm life and duties are greatly impacted by the changing weather; Sutphen established a nice contrast between different periods of the year.

Sutphen grew up on a farm in Minnesota, so I believe the words and language she chose were reflective of her childhood.  I drew many connections myself, as I still remember vivid images of my grandparents’ rural home.  I especially loved the line “He keeps his hills in dandelion carpet”, as though the landscape itself is a home he has to tend to.  Seas of dandelions are common, but still are such powerful visuals of the sunny, quiet countryside.   I also loved “His field are oceans of heat, where waves of gold beat the burning shore”.  Although it portrays the dry summer days, there is still freshness by using “ocean” and “waves”, proving that even in the blazing sun, the garden remains rich.

The poet captures the liveliness and spirit of farmland, especially when she says “crops suck rain from the sky and swallow the smoldering sun”.  Along with her effective use of alliteration comes personification.  The fact that the vegetables are pulling in the water, rather than the rain simply falling on the land, gives the farmer’s garden more power.

I wish that the third verse began with “My father’s farm” or “His farm”, as the others do.  I would enjoy this repetition; it would place the farm as an immobile piece of landscape that can’t escape the changing seasons.  It may just be personal preference, but I also think the verses could be rearranged.  Ending with winter is so cold and dismal for a farm setting.  Placing this verse third would make it more of a climax, as if the winter has taken over and the crops are no longer able to grow.  Sutphen could then have ended with spring – bringing hope and new life to such a wonderful and colorful place.