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Charles G. Eastman’s “The Yellow Corn” · The Daily Poem

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  [music]
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  SPEAKER_00: Welcome back to The Daily Poem, a podcast from Goldberry Studios.
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  SPEAKER_00: I'm Sean Johnson, and today is Friday, October 23rd, 2026.
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  SPEAKER_00: Today's poem is by Charles G. Eastman.
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  SPEAKER_00: It's called The Yellow Corn.
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  SPEAKER_00: Eastman was a newspaper editor in Vermont in the mid-19th century.
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  SPEAKER_00: This particular poem was published in 1848, a simpler time.
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  SPEAKER_00: A number of his poems, similar to this one, have been set to music.
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  SPEAKER_00: At various times,
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  SPEAKER_00: I could not find a good recording of The Yellow Corn,
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  SPEAKER_00: but an enterprising folk musician has some great lyrics ready to hand here.
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  SPEAKER_00: And that's what this poem is.
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  SPEAKER_00: It's a folk poetry.
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  SPEAKER_00: It's a folk lyric.
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  SPEAKER_00: There's nothing particularly brilliant or transcendent about this poem.
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  SPEAKER_00: It is not a poem of ideas.
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  SPEAKER_00: And in today's poetic landscape, that is often, I think, the felt need.
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  SPEAKER_00: A poem has to have a compelling idea,
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  SPEAKER_00: but so often a good folk lyric is really more about a compelling sentiment.
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  SPEAKER_00: And part of what makes that sentiment compelling isn't that it's novel,
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  SPEAKER_00: it's that it's universal and recognizable.
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  SPEAKER_00: And the one place where we still, I think, have that today is pop music.
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  SPEAKER_00: And unfortunately, a lot of the sentiments and subjects there are just vapid and shallow.
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  SPEAKER_00: So I love this poem because it is concerned more with a sentiment than an idea,
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  SPEAKER_00: but it's still a profound one, a lovely one.
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  SPEAKER_00: There is a joyful gratitude for a thing we now take for granted.
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  SPEAKER_00: And granted, yellow corn has become this kind of pernicious enemy in the lives of many of us.
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  SPEAKER_00: It is now overproduced and snuck into all of our foods.
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  SPEAKER_00: But the principle remains.
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  SPEAKER_00: And when you're eating corn as corn, it is absolutely lovely.
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  SPEAKER_00: And one of the unique American beauties is to look upon a big field of corn tall
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  SPEAKER_00: and ready for the harvest.
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  SPEAKER_00: So today's poem is valuable because it is a testimony to and an expression
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  SPEAKER_00: of spontaneous,
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  SPEAKER_00: earnest joy and gratitude for things we now tend to take for granted.
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  SPEAKER_00: And Lord knows we could all use more of that.
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  SPEAKER_00: Here's the poem, The Yellow Corn.
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  SPEAKER_00: Come, boys, sing, sing of the yellow corn.
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  SPEAKER_00: Sing, boys, sing, sing of the yellow corn.
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  SPEAKER_00: He springeth up from the fallow soil with the blade so green and tall.
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  SPEAKER_00: He payeth well the reaper's toil when the husks in the autumn fall,
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  SPEAKER_00: the pointed leaves in the golden ear, the rustling sheaves in the ripened year.
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  SPEAKER_00: Sing, boys, sing, sing of the yellow corn.
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  SPEAKER_00: Sing, boys, sing, sing of the yellow corn.
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  SPEAKER_00: He drinks the rain in the summer long,
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  SPEAKER_00: And he loves the streams that run,
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  SPEAKER_00: And he sends the stalk so stout and strong To bask in the summer sun.
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  SPEAKER_00: The pointed leaves in the golden ear,
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  SPEAKER_00: The rustling sheaves in the ripened year, Sing,
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  SPEAKER_00: boys, sing, sing of the yellow corn, Sing, boys, sing, sing of the yellow corn.
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  SPEAKER_00: He loves the dews of the starry night,
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  SPEAKER_00: And the breathing wind that plays with his tassels green,
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  SPEAKER_00: When the mellow light of the moon on the meadow stays.
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  SPEAKER_00: The pointed leaves in the golden ear,
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  SPEAKER_00: The rustling sheaves in the ripened year, Sing,
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  SPEAKER_00: boys, sing, sing of the yellow corn, Sing, boys, sing, sing of the yellow corn.
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  SPEAKER_00: A glorious thing is the yellow corn,
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  SPEAKER_00: With the blade so green and tall,
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  SPEAKER_00: A blessed thing is the yellow corn, When the husks in the autumn fall.
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  SPEAKER_00: Then sing, boys, sing, sing of the yellow corn.
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  SPEAKER_00: Sing, boys, sing, sing of the yellow corn.
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  SPEAKER_00: The pointed leaves in the golden ear, the rustling sheaves in the ripened year.
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  SPEAKER_00: Come, sing, boys, sing, sing of the yellow corn.
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  SPEAKER_00: Sing, boys, sing, sing of the yellow corn.
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  SPEAKER_00: This has been The Daily Poem.
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  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for listening.
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  SPEAKER_00: We'll be back next week with more poetry for you.
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  SPEAKER_00: Between now and then,
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  SPEAKER_00: feel free to visit us at dailypoempod.substack.com,
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  SPEAKER_00: where you can listen to past episodes of The Daily Poem,
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  SPEAKER_00: For all of us at Goldberry Studio, I'm Sean Johnson wishing you happy reading.