tomato picking at the farm

by midday the cicadas are screaming,
their wings rasping in the trees,
but could you be bothered
of such noise, such business
when it is indicative of summer?
leave the hair product and sweet
shimmery moisturizers far behind,
as the mosquitos are so inclined
to sample the tasty fool found
without deep woods deet.
perspiration treads steadily
down your spine, beads mounting
on your brow and behind your knees:
then there rolls a steady breeze
to keep you on your feet to pick.

dark earth, gloppy from the rains
adheres to everything, at times
freezing you in your last step.
tomatoes are waiting on vine, in rows
along the highway beyond the sunflowers:
some fermenting with a grouping of flies,
others as green as the foliage,
but the ripe ones are also there,
ready to be twisted and twisted away,
into the baskets of pickers.
the air is salted in the tartness
of the saucy tomato, fuzzy from the plants
and delirious with the many kinds
farmers have planted this year.
cherry, beef, yellow, and ugly,
each for taste and looks apart
as different as the pickers out
in sunhats and old clothes,
some on their hands and knees,
others coraling children to the tent.

ugly tomatoes, heirloom variety,
the nice Greek man says,
are tucked in the middle and back
of the fields, where no one is looking.
try them, he urges, you won't regret it.
ugly tomatoes, dipping tersely on the vine,
their puckered girth astounding,
weigh more than the other kinds.
it was not until later, when sliced and served,
that we became aware that each was gold.