[E-magazin]: Lullaby of the Season

My hometown now has a part of agricultural land converted to make way for factories or important transportation projects. The remaining land is still planted with rice, although less, but enough for me to come back and hear the lullaby of the season, even though there is a bit of regret.

“Afternoon takes me back to the time of the cauldron and the farmer/ listening to the river singing a lullaby of the coming season/ the curved sickle calls each other into the chaff (*) to wait/ the rice is red at the beginning, the question mark engraves the blue sky”... I often return to the village when the harvest season begins. When the lychee fields are full of fruit and the sweet fragrance. Hoang Hon leisurely drapes a light blue veil over the wild grass by the river. From afar, the rice fields look like a brilliant painting. The painting is skillfully painted by the artist of nature with the golden color of ripe rice, mixed with the light purple afternoon light, creating a space that is both real and virtual, extremely splendid.

Harvest season has come, each film of a distant time slowly returns. People often say that harvest season is the most beautiful season of rice. Not only because of the brilliant colors but also because this is the time when the working people can enjoy the fruits of their labor after months of sun and dew. This afternoon on the deserted riverbank, looking at the dark yellow color of each rice flower bending like a shy young girl, I remember just the other day, the rice fields were still green and young. The rice stalks have now turned dark yellow. Each grain of rice is like a real pearl sparkling under the sunlight. When the wind blows, the rice fields undulate like soft waves... under the golden sunlight, the fragrant scent of rice spreads throughout the fields, carrying the breath of heaven and earth, making people's hearts flutter... The whole space is immersed in the feeling of the harvest in harmony with nature: "Outside the riverbank, the sweet song/ ripe lychee urges cicadas to linger/ the May sun in my hometown is full of fire/ frogs call for love, the mollusks wait for the moon"...

Harvest season in my memory is a busy time. When the royal poinciana flowers are blooming in the school yard and the cicadas sing in unison, it is also the time when we are on summer vacation.

In the morning, my mother woke up very early, the fire was already flickering in the small kitchen. She prepared breakfast for the whole family. As for me, I had prepared the sickle, rope, and pole, my legs neatly wrapped in leggings, to prepare to go to the field.

The village road was bustling with the laughter of the simple and honest farmers, the excitement of the people when the golden harvest season was bountiful. It was the bowl of green tea they shared with each other during their break under the kapok tree in the middle of the field.

Summer is not always sunny, but sometimes there are sudden rains. In the morning there was no sign of rain, but in the middle of the day, dark clouds gathered and the sky turned dark and poured water down. People's sweat soaked and mixed with the rain. Only then did I realize how hard it was for farmers to grow rice. My hometown is a low-lying rice field, with a lot of sun and rain, flooding all year round. There were years when the rice was still milky when it rained. My grandmother sighed because the rice fields in the lowlands were soaked and rotten. And the poem I wrote when I was away from home to study, which I have not read to her, still haunts me to this day: "June is the month of dragon's blood/ she often said/ this afternoon, looking at the water pouring down and the rain/ I worry about the harvest coming to my hometown"...

I miss you so much that every time I have a summer vacation, I come home right away. I wake up early in the morning and run to the fields, all the way to the riverbank with a long dike that curves like a silk strip, open my chest, and take a deep breath as if I want to swallow all that fresh air. To remember the old harvest seasons. To remember the bright moonlit nights, after the afternoon the harvested rice is spread evenly on the lime yard or brick yard. The long round stone shafts have ropes tied at both ends to pull. Two people behind hold bamboo "cu neo" to push the shaft to rotate. Beautiful love stories in the countryside sometimes also begin with those moonlit nights: "Looking into each other's eyes, drunk on the scent of rice/ the "cu neo" whispers someone's promise/ the rotating shaft is fragrant with golden grains"...

In the clear blue sky, flocks of white storks like paper boats tilt their wings to fly. Occasionally they swoop down and perch on the newly built stubble mounds yesterday afternoon. The sound of the wind blends with the chirping of the larks, creating a symphony full of the flavor of the countryside. There are afternoons on the windy dike, after gleaning rice, the buffalo children lie down, tease each other, and compete to sing loudly the nursery rhyme I wrote for them every summer activity: "Flocks of white storks along the dike/ busy watching the ripe rice fields/ the sunset is almost over/ not ready to go home yet, storks"...

Then those children, like birds, also left the village and flew far away. They left behind the bamboo banks, rice roots and the river of their childhood to roam on new roads, carrying with them their own desires and ambitions. But then, every season, they, like me, returned. Returning to find beautiful memories, sometimes just to silently ask: "Do you still remember the straw of that season/ your brown shirt, your round chest, full of seeds/ which straw did you use to tie your hands"...

This afternoon, I was lost in the middle of the fields, lost in the distant past... My hometown now has a part of the agricultural land converted to make way for factories or important transportation projects. The remaining area is still planted with rice, although less, but enough for me to return and hear the lullaby of the season, even though there is a bit of wistfulness and regret: "I absentmindedly hold the pearl in my hand/ the lonely fields, the herons sadly go away/ the fish, shrimp, crabs, grasshoppers do not return/ the person is far away, where can I send my memories"...

And in the memories of the season, the grasshoppers in green and red bibs are still the same, innocently stepping out from the seven-colored rainbow after the rain.

(*) A part of the sickle

Content: Le Phuong Lien

Photo: Internet Document

Graphics: Mai Huyen

Source: https://baothanhhoa.vn/e-magazin-khuc-ru-mua-250211.htm