I Met Maria In a Farm Field

By Tim Lacy ´22

My father was a Gung-Ho seaman

Maria, the Sea, was like his wife 

But send his children westward bound 

Was the first thing he did, having made it home Promising them a piece of land, 

To grow corn, to feed themselves to life 

And to sell cornmeal, to the mill to be ground 

And time went by, 

And I never thought Maria, in her heart of the sea Would still be watching, from beyond the endless skies As I ploughed up more ground, first by ox, than by tractor For first hog’s mash, then methanol, then whiskey Gained interest from others, for economic factors 

But Maria still saw me with her sunlit eyes 

As I took everything, from the agrarian ground She became irate, with my exploiting way of life That I thought was on my property, my very own And yet she had vengeance a comin’ for me, 

But no common man told me what I did was wrong No legislation said my ways should be banned So I continued my ways, thinking it would last till I was gone 

I didn’t think I’d see that day come 

The Rangers told me, there’s fires 

In the Western Mountains 

The cowboys told me things are 

A’ dead and still drying’ 

On the Texas-Oklahoma plains 

And the news told me there was a flood 

Across the Houston metropolis 

But the news is just meant as political bane 

It’s my right to choose, that they are lying 

But I go out, as to the storm I begin to surrender And say, Maria, in your mercy, 

Would you spare my farm and my fields? 

As, as it did at the birth of the sea, 

Down from the sky, came excess rain.

And I can hear that cyclone 

Stir and brood 

But I’ll defend as I should have done before, For what I already had, in peaceful fighting But I didn’t then, And I really can’t now Do more, but feel like I’m standing my ground I run towards Maria, across the farm field 

Ave, Maria!