In Ontario, Quebec, Vermont and other eastern areas, tourists pay hard-earned money for a bus tour to view the fall colours of the ripened forest.
And while the colours of crimson leaves can be soothing, nothing can be as exhilarating as the rustle of ripened wheat when the wind slowly makes its way across a great expanse of prairie.
While the maple leaf continues to mesmerize many, the amber waves of wheat that depict an ocean of grain
on a hot August afternoon are rarely mentioned in Canadian song and poetry.
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In 1893, a Massachusetts educator sat atop Pikes Peak in Colorado. While observing a field of wheat near the mountain, Katherine Lee Bates wrote the words toAmerica the Beautiful.Thus the opening lines, “Oh beautiful for spacious skies, for amber waves of grain” rang in the heart and souls of Americans for generations to come.
Sadly, however, few notable Canadian songs or poems mention wheat.
What inspired my letter was a bus tour I hosted for Quebec tourists last year. They were in awe over the beauty of a field of ripened durum on the flat plains of southwestern Saskatchewan.
One elderly lady exclaimed, “of all the things I’ve seen in Canada, this is the most beautiful scene there is.”
Another exclaimed, “this is one Canadian attraction we never knew about.”
As my grandmother once said, what are they teaching in school these days?
John Hamon,
Gravelbourg, Sask.
