Harvest Hymn (Essay 7)

A head of cabbage is quite a bit heavier than it looks. I almost dropped the first one I cut, surprised by the sudden weight of it in my unskilled hands. Yet it did not take me long to find the meter of the field, the rhythm of the blade in my hand and the rows of vegetables before me. Pierce, twist, pull, toss. Pierce, twist, pull, toss. The monotony of this harvest hymn was soothing, the damp coolness of each rubbery cabbage a relief from the torrid Florida sun, the bending and stretching welcome to a body so often too still. Setting down my knife and tossing the last cabbage of the row into the black crate, I pressed my hands into the earth beneath me and felt intimately and immensely connected to the universe.

As I filled crate after crate with heads of cabbage, the repetitive physical labor encouraged my thoughts to roam. I realized that before I arrived in the cabbage patch, I had not even known how cabbage grew. To me, cabbage had been coleslaw at the diner where my brother works, sauerkraut at the local hotdog stand, or at most, the perfect pyramid of uniform spheres under the strange yellow light in the produce section of the grocery store. I had never considered a field like the one in front of me, full of perfect grocery store cabbages, yes, but also riddled with those that were misshapen, too small, oddly-colored, or already beginning to rot. When I walked through those fields of cabbages plants in every state of growth—from tiny sprouts to harvested stalks—I began to feel a deep sense of shame for the extreme lack of connection between myself and the food that I buy and eat.

Kneeling into the next row of plants, I was reminded of a book I once read about migrant farm workers in America. The book told the rarely-spoken story that is behind those perfectly-shaped cabbages in our grocery stores, and behind so much of our nation’s food. It was the story of a broken family just trying to survive in a land that refuses to acknowledge even their humanity. It was the story of children who are choked and strangled by carelessly sprayed pesticides, of children for whom school is not even a distant dream, of children whose parents must decide between food and basic healthcare, of children who become old long before their fifth birthday. Yet when I read that book, my head hurt, my heart hurt, but my shoulders did not, and I soon forgot. All too quickly I forgot the plight of the migrant worker and her stillborn daughter, her bleeding hands, and her broken faith. It was not until I felt the earth beneath my palms and the weariness of a single morning in the cabbage field that her heart beat in my chest and I began to understand.

By now that field has been plowed under, the soil that once rested so calmly beneath my pulsing palms is now scattered across the plot. Soon the workers will plant a new crop of cabbages and it will not be long before they are again singing the rhythmic refrain of the harvest hymn. Pierce, twist, pull, toss. Pierce, twist, pull, toss. I will hear their song; the pulse of the field rhythm now burns through my veins and I will not forget.