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 November Cotton Flower by Jean Toomer 
						Boll-weevil's coming, and the winter's cold,Made cotton-stalks look rusty, seasons old,
 And cotton, scarce as any southern snow,
 Was vanishing; the branch, so pinched and slow,
 Failed in its function as the autumn rake;
 Drouth fighting soil had caused the soil to take
 All water from the streams; dead birds were found
 In wells a hundred feet below the ground--
 Such was the season when the flower bloomed.
 Old folks were startled, and it soon assumed
 Significance. Superstition saw
 Something it had never seen before:
 Brown eyes that loved without a trace of fear,
 Beauty so sudden for that time of year.
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