whisper | nichepoetryandprose

poetry and prose about place

Posts Tagged ‘whisper’

comparing landscapes

When you are visiting an area away from home, what do you notice about the landscape?

As we were driving the roads of south-east Ontario, I was always comparing the scenes I was seeing with the landscapes of home in south-central New Brunswick.

Both areas are hilly and rural, with a strong agricultural base. Both are forested wherever farmland is not the main land use. The trees in south-eastern Ontario are predominantly hardwood with some cedar, fir and pine, whereas ours are mostly mixed wood with a stronger component of conifers (spruce, fir and pine).

Probably the thing I noticed most about the Ontario farming landscape was the predominance of corn as a crop. When we were there, the ‘eating’ corn had already been harvested, but corn for silage (mostly used for cattle) was growing everywhere. It stood tall in golden fields, mostly broadcast, without corn-rows.

The corn was ready for harvest, the corn kernels held in stout, starchy ears. I think ‘ears’ is such an apt word for corn since the sense of hearing is shaken awake when you stand in a cornfield. This time of year, the long leaves are dry and rustle in the slightest breeze, carrying on a whispering conversation in an unknowable language.