Crowd Noise

In the last two weeks the field has gone from pale embers of amber in the evening sun to parchment, dry and off white. Bleached and dessicated by the constant breeze and the inconstant sun, the sheaves chatter in the breeze like the crowd of a rock concert waiting for the main event. 

 Among the wheat the occasional poppy glows like a drop of blood. It's easy to look at these perfect flat fields with their rich payloads of grain 

and think that it has always been so peaceful. But these fields are hard won. They have been husbanded from the fens. They have been raised on shallow islands carved as much by the waves of militant men as by the ancient fen waters. This is the fen-edge, where a lonely outpost of high ground touches the ancient wetlands. These grounds have been loot, precious as rubies. Our ancestors have died here, as surely as they breathed and sowed. The poppies here, as everywhere in our culture, are memorials.

 As I look deeper, I'm shocked at the number of poppies among the oats. There are thousands of seedheads; ghosts among the peaceful crops, waiting for their own reapers who crawl into the fields, as night falls, headlamps ablaze.