Boll-weevil's coming, and the winter's cold, <br />Made cotton-stalks look rusty, seasons old, <br />And cotton, scarce as any southern snow, <br />Was vanishing; the branch, so pinched and slow, <br />Failed in its function as the autumn rake; <br />Drouth fighting soil had caused the soil to take <br />All water from the streams; dead birds were found <br />In wells a hundred feet below the ground-- <br />Such was the season when the flower bloomed. <br />Old folks were startled, and it soon assumed <br />Significance. Superstition saw <br />Something it had never seen before: <br />Brown eyes that loved without a trace of fear, <br />Beauty so sudden for that time of year.<br /><br />Jean Toomer<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/november-cotton-flower/
