Jean Toomer

Black reapers with the sound of steel on stones Are sharpening scythes. I see them place the hones ,In their hip-pockets as a thing that’s done .And start their silent swinging, one by one

The sky, lazily disdaining to pursue The setting sun, too indolent to hold ,A lengthened tournament for flashing gold ,Passively darkens for night’s barbecue

,Hair–braided chestnut ,coiled like a lyncher’s rope ,Eye–fagots

,Boll-weevil’s coming, and the winter’s cold ,Made cotton-stalks look rusty, seasons old ,And cotton, scarce as any southern snow ,Was vanishing; the branch, so pinched and slow