Planting Pumpkins

When you’re planting pumpkins
it’s important to recall
Which crop you’d like to harvest
come along the season Fall

Two times, in fact, it’s happened
Yes, before my very eyes
That the very seeds of pumpkins
were sunflowers in disguise

Once it even happened,
and to my mother too!
That the summer squash she planted
into zucchini grew!

The culprits, I am certain,
are neither she nor I
But are in fact the winged folk
of the genus Mystici

They’re rarely heard from now-a-days
except when circumstance allow
Like when the Earth is opened
by the steel blade of the plow

And seeds dropped in to do their best
with sunshine, rain, and air,
Against those mischievous Fairy Folk
they scarcely have a prayer

So when you’re planting pumpkins
you must follow protocol
To trick those tricky creatures
before they ruin the bounteous Fall

The pumpkins must be planted
the second full moon of Spring
After the Night brings Darkness down
but before the Midnight rings

And as the Nocturnal Miscreants
awake to play their games
The pumpkin seeds must be retrieved
by your own conniving hands

And if you stay up late enough
and at your unplanted garden peer
In the full-moon bright-light spring-time night
the plan comes brilliantly clear

The Fairy Types have been deceived
by your very tricky work
And never will they waste a night
digging through the vacant dirt

The pumpkin seeds are safe tonight
in the pocket of your coat
And tomorrow you can plant them all
free from worry of the joke

But along when it is Harvest Time
please keep relations kind
And set out for those merry Larks
a plate of warm, well-seasoned rind