There is no historical evidence that the scythe was ever used as a weapon. It is, plainly and simply, an agricultural tool, and if the common working man were to ever have the need to take up arms—perhaps to resist the depreciation of his crops or to protest the high rate of debt in his community—he would likely reach for his pitchfork, his maul, his shovel—and allow his scythe, its blade worn and dulled from stray pebble and sand, to sit peacefully in the back shed.
If you look out, beyond and over the hill, you will see a Farmer in the field. The Farmer is not always in the field—there are many other working parts on a Farm that need attending to—but today it is a dense fall morning and the dew will cling long to the quivering stalks of the Farmer’s ripe crop, past the sun’s rising and well into its eastern arc, and so today the Farmer is in the field, because a scythe cuts best when the grass is wet.
That is not to say that this particular scythe, in the palms of this particular Farmer, would have much trouble in weather drier than now. Perhaps a split end here or there, the beginnings of wear on the blade, metal easily shepherded back into alignment by the Farmer’s keen whetstone, fine-but-not-too-fine-grind, the best and most loyal friend of any steel that yearns for sharpness. This scythe is long-bladed and razor-edged—a testament to the Farmer’s honed knowledge and skill. It will not be deterred by a mere drop in humidity.
Still, part of caring for one’s tools is allowing them to work in ideal conditions. The Scythe does not need to be tested to its limit, constantly pushing the boundaries of scytheness. It only needs to reap the crop.
The process is simple. A short step into the swathe. Steady grip on the handles and a planting of the feet. Then—arms sweep, an artful curve from hip to spine, as if the body were enshrouded in steam and slowly bent by two hands. Across, follow through. Let the weight of the blade do the work.
Scht.
And again.
Scht.
And again.
Scht.
July 6, 1685. James Scott, 1st Duke of Monmouth, leads 5,000 peasant-soldiers to battle against the English Army in an attempt to overthrow his uncle, King James II. They are armed with 5,000 straight-handled polearms, at the ends of which sit 5,000 curved blades—cutting edge, concave. A so-called “war-scythe” can no longer harvest grain, or mow grass, or do much of anything a scythe might be wont to do. The blade has been separated from the snath, thrown in the fire and reforged, refitted. The tang has been strengthened with extraneous rods and bolts, and the entire head has been twisted a full ninety degrees so that the tip points outward, can slide into a stomach easier than a stalk. The peasants lose desperately, and it takes several swings of the ax before the Duke’s head knocks loose.
One of the most important aspects of scythe maintenance is the sharpening of the blade. The Farmer keeps a small, water-filled sheath at their hip, in which the whetstone sits, never more than a quickdraw away. The Farmer reaches for it now, stands the Scythe on its upper grip so that the blade—wet, spattered with plant matter—hangs long and looming. The detritus is easily wiped away by the sunwarm cotton of the Farmer’s sleeve.
It’s best to start on the side of the scythe facing away from you so that, in the case of a lingering burr, the sharp flap will point up toward the grass, and not down toward the soil. The Farmer is always very certain to remove the burr in its entirety with a single, practiced swipe of the whetstone, and so they have not made this mistake in a very long time, but every master was once a beginner, and so the Farmer starts on the inside of the blade.
One stroke on the left, stone against spine, and then an equal stroke on the right. In bits like this, all down the length of the blade. Just a few times over is enough. In fifteen minutes, the Farmer will stop and repeat this process, so that there is never a single moment when the blade is dull. Tomorrow morning, before the sun rises, the Farmer and Scythe will settle at the anvil and peen yesterday’s wear from the blade—the sharp plink of the hammer, the dawn’s first birdsong.
The Farmer brushes their thumb across the blade and deems it sharp enough. Back on the ground, amongst the crop, the soft metal reflects a ghostly blue. Ghosts are always blue, aren’t they? In the same way that the plague is black and the whale is white and the Scythe is long and looming. Some type of truth that is not a reality.
Scht, scht, scht.
Just like that, the stalks are severed clean through, their blue light fading as they fall, gently, the laying of a head on a warm pillow. The Scythe guides them to the windrow, where they will rest until the field is done, waiting patiently to be threshed with the Farmer’s flail. The threshing will be hard and heaving, but the fruit must be knocked loose so that the grain can be properly harvested, so that the empty stalks may relax into new soil, ready to fertilize a future crop.
The Farmer wipes the sweat from their brow and replants the woven hat on their head. A flail, yes, that could do some damage. Have you ever seen Death brandish a flail? No? How odd. It is very difficult to hurt yourself with a scythe. The snath is much too long, and the point of the blade is huddled down and away. Is it sharpness that people find so frightening? Curvature? Or is it simply the process of reaping? The moment that one stalk is severed from the rest?
George Washington is not a wheat farmer. He piles the tasks that would make him so onto the heads and backs and necks and arms and shoulders and legs of the people he keeps imprisoned at Mount Vernon. Washington arms them with scythes at the harvest and expects to reap the fruits of their labor.
It is very important that wheat is harvested in a timely manner. The berries are only ripe for so long, and the crows and the winds will have them even before they soften. Mount Vernon’s reapers set out in a team, scythes in hand, and make the decision to work as slowly as possible, like scientists held hostage, sabotaging in small ways the world-ending weapons they are forced to create. They ding their blades on rocks, twist their ankles in the field, wield their false incompetence like it is hot and iron, know that it will fold into the finest of steel. Washington does not notice, because he believes he is a wheat farmer. He will not notice until the day his throat grows sore and tired.
Scht, scht, scht.
Even once the threshing is done, soul-grain can be tricky to winnow. Its chaff is heavy and it clings to the fruit, stubborn, through even harsh winds. The seeds are small—rough, but fragile—and they cannot easily roll themselves down the slant of a cookie tin, leaving the chaff behind. And so the Farmer must attend to the grain by hand. Just a few at a time, to rub against the callouses and crevices of their palms, careful not to crack.
Here, a hare, cut and shredded by large talons and hawk chick mouths. A human, old, with a UTI that has spread to the kidneys. A human, young, caught beneath the rumble of a bulldozer. A great tree, felled after 200 years, and with it the host of lives it sheltered. They run through the Farmer’s fingers and into the sieve, where the loosened chaff can catch in the Farmer’s cool breath, carry off and collect as dust bunnies in the shed, as all things eventually do.
For now, though, the Farmer is in the field, and it has begun to rain. It is not so much at first, but soon the swath is sludgy and slick, and the Scythe’s chine cakes with mud. The Farmer sighs, unsticks their sinking boot with a pop, untangles the Scythe from the stalks, and finds, in the curve of the blade, a freshly-cut seed head, still thrumming with a quiet light. As one would do with any infant, the Farmer gently lifts its cradle and shields it from the pouring rain.
T.E.Z. Moore (they/them) is a queer writer and farmhand from Lancaster, Pennsylvania. They wrote their piece out of a growing irritation at scythe-wielding fantasy RPG characters, a transitive love for hand tools, and a firm belief that poetry is inherent in human history. This is their first publication.