The Buffalo Mound Presents:

"Plain View Farm Reveries" by Ronald Ginther

These reveries were composed on site, at Plain View Farm, during the start of a reunion, then presented to those gathered in the parlor for the various programs. For some reason, I was so taken by the soil of the farm, which came alive to my senses and feelings, as it had never done so before. Cherished soil, it meant more than I could say, but I quickly jotted down some notes, from which I gave this account of my reveries. After the meeting and when we had all gone various ways for the evening, I had a most strange experience. I was standing along with Aunt Ruth and others at the back of the house outdoors, and I looked up, and it seemed to me the house assumed a while, ship-like form and was sailing resolutely and steadfastly through many billows and waters of time! I was so struck by the impression, I mentioned it immediately to Aunt Ruth. She looked at the house, but did not say anything. Did she see the same thing I did? It was a profound impression, and I never forgot it.--Ronald Ginther

I

I marvel as I hold Plain View's soil in my palm, so dark, rich, complex--hoarding the secret of life itself!

God created this stuff of life, the good earth, and I wonder...I wonder...

II

I wonder how many blistering Julys passed over this bit of earth--

the August heat too, so sultry and humid

that made corn grow audibly--can you hear it? my sister, my brother?

Rustling, a sea of leaves waving through the hours of the night,

the kernels of corn swelling and bursting with milky juices?

III

How many brief, frail, yet explosive springs erupted from this virgin soil

like a volcano of new life--primeval, newly formed, beautiful,

and terrifying and strange--

bursting through winter's iron crust?

Whoosh! the brown grasses flattened to ground level by dirty snow--all gone!

Everywhere, as far as eye can see or foot can run,

millions green stems of grass and corn!

IV

And yes, we can count the golden sunsets of Indian summers,

harvest moons rising up swollen to giant size over the fields of ripened wheat,

and what of the pumpkins, golden in the garden,

their vines already wilting with nipping frost?

V

But the soil of life holds more than these growing things...

it was perhaps the very ground a young woman tread upon,

when she stood on Plain View once so many years ago--

abiding with Alfred her new husband, with babes in arm,

and chores to do from dawn to dusk--

yet with a heart still full of wonder over the ways of her great, wonderful,

and providential God--who brought her across a cold, heaving sea

from a narrow, sea-indented land to a widespread plain of plenty!

Can you see her standing on the ride of a hill beyond the barn?

Look closely at her face, the expression in her eyes, her tears--

is she wondering why her parents passed away when she was a young girl?" Later, when she was nearing life's end at 98, did she find the answer in her heart?

Like her, we stand now on Plain View Farm's soil, many of us with burning questions.

Together we might say:

"I am thy child, Mighty God,

and though I sail this speck of dust, this old earth,

taking my turn to be born, then growing up from childhood to maturity, to work and marry and bear children perhaps, then see the children go away to make new homes, while I grow old, and older, and then pass away...it is Thy story, nevertheless, in which I am just a page in thy grand book, O Lord!"

VI

Let it be remembered that Ruth and Tom came back to Plain View Farm and bought this soil and preserved it for us all.

Going to the entrance of the farm, I find the old gate Grandpa fashioned with such care and love and pride long ago is crumbling away. I clear away the vines and branches and leaves that hide it from view.

The gate posts were made by Alfred with many-colored stones set in concrete to make lasting beauty for the eye of the ones going in and going out. There are stones of pink quartz, a pinkish red granite, and even an agate.

I press some fallen stones back into the masonry.

Some of the stones are long gone, vanished, no doubt, for I cannot find them.

And if my stone ever falls out, who will press it back? Who?

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