Prayer for an Agricultural Future

This series of books, Prayer for an Agricultural Future, was mostly made while I was working on a farm this past summer.   They all explore, in some way or another, the theme of being connected to land and landscape and of working with the land.

Beet love

It’s a dark earth kind of

day after day love I’ve got.

Damp earth and maybe sun tomorrow

and my hands in the dirt beside yours.

Pulling beets in the rain

and the cold water down my neck

and red bulbs against greygreen hills,

saying, yes, like this, days like this.

It’s this,

day after day,

with my hands in the dirt beside yours,

that I’ve got.

Beet love.

This book is called Prayer for an Agricultural Future 1. Modified coptic binding; cardboard, drawing paper, watercolor, and Chinese black ink cover.

This one is Prayer for An Agricultural Future 2/2. Internal strap binding; paper bag and notebook paper, cardboard, and ink cover, elastic to hold shut.

This one, Northeast Kingdom, is named for Vermont's Northeast Kingdom, where I was working. Button hole binding; paper bag, cardboard, Chinese black ink and brush cover.

This Far North 1 is hand drawn on paper bag and inside the pages are lined with text. The text expressed the sadness of leaving the farm, and a deep desire to one day return to farming. Slanted cross binding.

This book, This Far North 2, is a combination of watercolor and ink. The inside contains text and some stitching along the pages, as well as a block print. Bar-loop binding.

This Far North 2, inside cover.

These three books are Garlic Harvest 1/3, 2/3, and 3/3. All three are paper bag and pen, the first two are bar-loop bindings and the third is a strap binding.

Garlic Harvest 3/3

Beet love is named for a poem about pulling beets with the person you love. Both front and back covers are a block print and the inside has the text of the poem running along the pages as well as in the back. Coptic binding; paper bag, cardboard, block print and acrylic paint.

Beet love, inside back cover with text.

Beet love calendar 2009. This calendar, made with the same block print as Beet love, is a day by day calendar for 2009. Bar-loop binding.

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