Returning to West Texas
I want to know how you are what you are called,
I want to get specific.
I want to be with you
as you are with one another
in your orderly city of acres.
What did this one piece of land offer you in the season of your becoming;
was it rich enough?
Did the bobwhite quail fly above you
and did they call down to you and offer you a name?
And what of the wind,
the tyrannical high plains wind with nothing to give break
but you.
How many leaves did you suffer to her ruthless gales,
how many precious flowers?
When the machines finally come for you,
it will be winter
and the heaving of their engines will be loud against your naked land.
You will become undone,
metal,
noise,
electric light, no sun.
I will find you rearranged
and I will ask the same of you in our time at my loom.
There, I will remember the snake who spent his last hour wiling in your dense underbrush,
your mottled leaves turning dark as Autumn exhales.
PHOTO JOURNAL :FIELD DAY
Photographs from a day spent with the Texas Organic Cotton Marketing Co-op
Woolam Gin, O'Donnell, Texas
USDA Classing Facility, Lubbock, TX
Organic Cotton Fields, West Texas
MORE CONTEXT
A monthly list of relevant sources, objects and inspiration
Watching this episode of Chef's Table, drawing inspiration from Ben Shewry's muster and commitment to his native land.
Listening to this podcast as a way to recover from reading this book.
Listening to this perfect driving album while on the road.
A thoughtful friend gifted me this book and I continue dipping into it as I research the history of cotton.
Similarly, renowned cotton breeder Sally Fox recommended this book when considering corollaries between the origin of rice cultivars and cotton cultivars in the United States. An academic read, to be sure, but fascinating!
On my holiday wish list, these bed sheets woven in the USA from West Texas organic cotton.
Learn more about these extraordinary farmers.