Cane by Jean Toomer

Boll-weevil's coming, and the winter's cold, Made cotton-stalks look rusty, seasons old, And cotton, scarce as any southern snow, Was vanishing; the branch, so pinched and slow, Failed in its function as the autumn rake;

Drouth fighting soil had caused the soil to take All water from the streams; dead birds were found In wells a hundred feet below the ground -- Such was the season when the flower bloomed.