Intoxicated by the mystical marijuana plants,
rising from the heart of the earth,
so resinous on the inhaled joint.
Our DNA slowly turned to THC.
Like seed turning to flower,
On the fertile crescents of the Eel River, where we grew our first sinsemilla,
When totem salmon still spawned
Along the deep pools and gravel beds.
Yes, Those terraced Babylonian pot gardens of olden times,
Nourished by mountain springs.
How endearing were the Magical green tree frogs clinging to the swaying colas in September?
Cannabis farmers became rich, powerful,
as if the mighty bud made them immortal,
as if the outside world was forever locked out.
Upon the curtained land were the green matrixes,
blowing wind wafting dreamily with musky aromas.
The scents both skunky and fruity,
the flavors and strains unending.
All that easy money,
Everybody said,
All those 100-dollar bills.
A new commerce emerged in those chanticleer hills,
A plant that the richest and poorest in the cities revered.
Alas, it was a monoculture,
A lifestyle bought and paid for by the precious cannabis nuggets,
Remember when an ounce of herb was worth more than gold?
Then the Great Hellfire came via Huey Combat Helicopters raiding homesteads long sequestered into the green verdure.
Some say it was the fault of Green Rush hooligans coming next who breached the tipping point of decency and goodwill in those deep valleys and sequestered mountains.
When the end came, no one was prepared
Suddenly the pristine watersheds were
tainted with diesel dope,
and a 50 year back-to-the-land culture succumbed to the cartel called legalization
Thus, the Age of Anthropocene was thrust upon us:
Soon the Day-Star goddess became the Black Death of the forest.
A once sustainable Eden burned to piles of char by the carpetbaggers.
Yet Mom and Pop still search through the rubble,
For remnants and memories,
Of a world no more.
Pity our land once ruled by Gaia’s hidden world of Redwood Tree corridors, mighty Rivers, and the immense blue Pacific watching over it all.
Our bright star has lost its luminescence.
10,000 hours in the burning sun learning to grow the best Kush,
Raising our children in the emerald elysian—
A lucid cannabis dream deferred.
Mom and Pop watched in horror as the sweet exhaled homegrown smoke disappeared into the gossamer mist,
On the last day of living free in the Green Idyll.
wow, nice poem
similar to but more beautiful than mine:
The Weed Odyssey
Remember when we just put a seed in the ground
and waited for October to come around
In those glory days the plant was very healthy
after a few years we all felt wealthy
From forty dollars food stamps to thousand dollar pounds
there were no mites or powdery mildew frowns
It was a moment in time, the money amazing
we were beginning pot farmers, the trails were a-blazing
Hiking for hours up and down mountains
looking for springs and places for gardens
There were lessons to learn especially about mold
the enemy within that destroyed the gold
Wood rats, ripoffs, and Camp claimed its share
copters invaded and the hippies were scared
We hid plants under trees and even up in them
with loppers we carved out our camo kingdom
After Camp came the nineties greenhouse years
cover it with remay and forget all your fears
Then the mites joined the mold in a symphony of terror
vacuuming webs off of buds will be a memory forever
After predator mites failed, with pyrethrum you could bomb it
then the last hippie ethics were spewed like vomit
It was probably an odd way for kids to grow up
saying don’t call the cops, especially the whup! whup!
Growers counted the cash and the prices kept rising
vacations to faraway beaches were not surprising
When coke came along we were like Hollywood
we snorted that sweet powder whenever we could
The frisky hippies had sex then crying babies
and built country schools in the booming eighties
The teenagers got the green thumb and planted out Usal
then biked the crop home in backpacks every fall
When medical was legalized the price dropped lower
everyone from everywhere came to be a grower
If you wanted to keep piling up many pounds of dank
you had to grow hundreds of plants to still make bank
It was harder to sell if your weed lacked aroma
they wanted clones with names, that put you in a coma
With houses and land the hippies became entangled
after the sinsemilla boomed across the triangle
Foreign girls greeted us with open smiles
hordes of trimmers come to work harvest for awhile
From the ends of the earth the young people came
trimming weed for easy money was the game
Everyone was in it for the cold hard cash
the colorful workers vanished after the crash
When the whole mess was legalized in twenty sixteen
the enforcer John Ford showed up on the scene
So that’s the story of a very green dream
we rode it for decades, starting when young and lean
It was a complete surprise which dropped in our laps
a forty year boom which finally collapsed
I enjoyed reading your poem Paul–thanks for sending it along–“from forty dollars food stamps to thousand dollar pounds” a great line showing how far back in the history you go, and it rhymes!
Do you write other poems?
Here’s another from my rhyming phase:
Weed-dealing Rant
I asked my friend if he could help sell some weed
he took it with a smile recognizing my need
It wouldn’t be just a good deed for him
he’d take a cut though it would be slim
I had the pound ready and many more
he took a quick look then went out the door
I waited for weeks as my prospects became dimmer
with no good connections I felt like a beginner
After a month I said just bring it back
they probably want some gnarly green crack
He brought the pound back but something wasn’t right
I noticed a clump of stems as I held it to the light
It looked like a unit I’d never seen before
I’d never send a mess like this out the door
My trimmer said that’s not what I cleaned
I wasn’t naive waiting to be reamed
Pay me for the elbow or replace it please
I wasn’t going to plead down on my knees
The old school growers have a strict code
if I take it from you it’s as good as sold
Responsibility is the word that we use
it is a trust which we know not to abuse
Just another episode in the flakiest business
behind closed doors without any witnesses
He didn’t like my tone and delayed doing what’s right
I insisted he owed me and he got very uptight
I don’t like your pushy attitude he said
then replace the weed, your friend trashed the meds
He finally took the pound back and paid me in full
in the flakiest biz the petty thieves drool
So what is the lesson to learn from all this?
get out of the game if you can’t live your bliss
Clever, funny poem. And the scenario is so familiar: entitled pot yuppies welching on their debts–and the first dispensaries were even worse!
One mistake in your poem.
Growing Marijuana successfully at a high level is anything but easy.
It takes tons of hard work, dedication, attention, risk, bravery & back tben, luck of the draw often came into play.
I remember some extremely wet years that destroyed 60% of the triangle harvest.
Well said–and don’t forget rats, slugs, snails, disease, accidental hermaphrodite contamination, marauding cattle, hungry deer eating buds down to sticks, aggressive bears, mountain lions,rip-off speed freak neighbors wielding automatic weapons,daily CAMP helicopters, rivers and creeks running dry, and marauding wild pigs destroying entire gardens–even with all that, and the years of manual labor that destroyed my knees, it is the love of the land, and the privilege of living and working in a beautiful place that are the memories of what I wanted to come shining through in the poem, and it was an opportunity that will never come again.
Pigs in Babylon
This job didn’t take talent, or brains. Hell, a monkey could be trained to water plants. What it did take was the will to persevere against never ending adversity. Simple folks working in a simple economy: seeds, shovels, dirt, sun, water.
“Oh Lord, there she is again!,” huffed clueless Pa. She was a mean, old 600 pound sow, with no friends in the world—animal or human. Feral pigs were common in that riverside country of scrub, trees, and grasslands. Pig packs roamed for miles, and solitary adults would sometimes decide to stay in wet places—like our garden. So the heifer was wallowing that bright, sunny day, its pointy stub pig feet straight up, rolling grandly in the stinky irrigation water oozing from our pots. We had created the perfect mudhole habitat for this grotesque beast.
Ha-rumph! Ha-rumph! It was a warning grunt, as the pig spied Ma glaring sheepishly from the buckets on the other side of the patch. She melted slowly into the cover of the blooming Ishen trees.
“It’s snorting at you, Ma,” observed Pa, trying not to sound nervous.
Then the gnarly sow spotted both of the invaders. Ma and Pa crawled like scared puppies, as the monster levitated its hulking form to its feet, kicking up a cloud of dust. It pawed at the ground in a grunting, drunken rage. She cocked her fat pig snout in obtuse angles. Surely this was the hog’s last warning before the charge, thought the retreating Pa.
Lady luck smiled upon the farming couple once again. As they struggled through the muddy morass, the hateful sow just stared sullenly, and returned to its digging, wallowing destruction. Ma and Pa scrambled to the camouflaged opening of the secret trail. Here in the enchanted world of native grape, wild roses, and shiny manzanita, they often romped with their little kids. The rogue cops in helicopters couldn’t spot them here, and neither could that menacing pig.
Keep ’em coming…