Many years ago I attended a school harvest festival in a local church. Parents and children waited for the vicar to arrive… waited and waited. He finally arrived laden with shopping bags having obviously forgotten the engagement. During the interlude I bided my time by writing my version of the hymn ‘We Plough the Fields and Scatter.’ In the intervening twenty-odd years it was lost to the mists of time.
On Sunday morning we held a very agricultural harvest festival in our barn and the vicar was early! So early in fact that I was still in my overalls and work clothes and so had no time to write a new version. However Monday was torrentially wet, so settle down in your pew, open the service sheet and prepare to sing our first hymn…
We plough the fields and scatter,
With ‘help’ from the bossy EU,
They interfere in everything,
And tell us what to do!
They don’t know what a sheep is,
Of crops they’ve no idea,
They’re in the middle of intro-ducing,
More rules for us next year.
All paperwork surrounds us,
Is sent electronically now,
So thank all those in Bru-u-ssels,
That know not pig nor cow!
Emissions from our combines,
Are very bad indeed.
Many chemicals are banned now,
Putting at risk the seed.
We are all going backwards,
We’ll soon grown nothing at all,
They’ll shout hooray, on the day,
UK farming goes to the wall.
Rules and regu-la-tions,
Follow us wherever we farm,
Due to ageing fa-r-mers,
We can’t hear the alarm!
Those who’re farming near towns,
Are planting lots of bricks,
They keep their heads above wa-ter,
With a handsome cash-flow fix!
Wind and rain can’t hurt them,
Of drought they’ve no idea,
If they find themselves in trouble,
They’ll sell more land next year!
All neighbours that surround us,
Can’t stand the smell of muck!
It affects the price of pro-p-erty,
And they might come unstuck!
We thank our major superstores,
For screwing farmers dry,
They also rob their cust-o-mers,
They don’t really have to try.
They have lots of offers,
Our trolleys to augment,
They make profit on a loaf of bread
Of at least 1000 percent!
Our government doesn’t understand us,
Why should they even try?
When everything can come from abroad,
And farming’s left to die!
AMEN!
© Baldock Bard 2014
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Mrs Bard and I are Rosie-sitting for some friends who’ve gone on holiday. The other night I awoke to find her standing on Mrs Bard’s slumbering form re-enacting the famous pose from The Lion King. We have now hidden the dvd remote so we can’t be accused of corrupting one so young…
