Sunday, July 23, 2006

Purple Hull Peas aka Southern Peas

Purple hull peas take me back a ways
A much different time than nowadays
When you planted a garden for a whole crowd
And getting out of chores was not allowed

You planted and watered, picked and shelled
Stopping only for the dinner bell
If you wanted to eat what was grown
You kept on working without a moan

Back then the “grocery store” was the farm
You worked with your family arm and arm
And, what was grown thru blood, sweat and tears
Had to last the family for the year

After the harvests and the shelling
Came the canning with no rebelling
All went in jars after the water boiled
That was to make sure that nothing spoiled

Then, in the dead of winter, you see
Out came jars filled with purple hull peas
There were beans, corn and some tomatoes too
The pantry was filled with “what we grew”

A garden is seldom grown these days
People spend their time in other ways
But, the truth is those days were sublime
Southern peas, family and canning time
@Copyright 2006 Scarlet's Rhymes - The above and all poetry and pictures posted on this site can not to be copied or reproduced in any manner on the World Wide Web or any other published form without the written permission of the author/creator at scarlet@rhymecreek.com

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Fantastic!! Brings back a lot of good memories.

Scarlet said...

I planted Purple Hull peas in my garden this year.. for the first time!
And, everytime I go out to check on them, I am reminded of my grandmother!
Her policy was "You gotta help shell 'em or you don't git to eat 'em!" Needless to say, I shelled. :-)

Anonymous said...

Some were called Victory gardens.

Now I know what the peas look like up close

thanks

Anonymous said...

Sure I remember but i'm older than you lol Very good, keep on truckin gal Ned