Barley and a Bop Poem

The dual theme of my A to Z Challenge this year is the world of Commodities and Poetry Forms so the juxtaposition of these two themes may throw up some strange poems – could there be a Heroic Ode to Heating Oil or will it merit a Haiku or a Haibun – whichever, I will be endeavouring to bring you interesting facts about commodities that may change the way you think about the stuff we variously depend on…

By commodity I mean certain items that are of both sufficient value/volume to be traded in special markets and are generally volatile enough to attract traders in “Futures” which are a way of hedging bets in the trading world of stocks, shares and commodities.

The A to Z Challenge runs throughout April and will consist of 26 posts – there are only a couple of letters for which I couldn’t find commodities but plenty of poetry forms to carry the day!

Worldwide Trade in Barley 2022 $10.4 Billion

Barley is the oldest cultivated grain and still the forth most cultivated after maize, wheat, and rice. Bere was the Old English word for Barley and the word Barley comes from the Old English bærlic. The Old English bere-aern meaning “barley-store” gives us the modern word barn and showing the importance of this ancient grain. Grinding stones near the Sea of Galilee reveal traces of barley starch from 23,000years ago and by 9,000 years ago, domesticated barley (unable to reproduce without human assistance) is found throughout the Fertile Crescent including Mesopotamia, sometimes thought to be the original Garden of Eden.

In 2022, 155 million tonnes of barley were grown worldwide with Russia in the lead at 15% followed by France Germany and Canada. You can read more details about all aspects of Barley here. However, the thing to be concerned about over barley as a commodity is that it is threatened by Climate Change. Modern barley ideally likes a cool climate without too much rain which is perhaps why it enjoys northern continental interiors but even these areas are threatened by the rising temperatures of global warming and the unpredictable extremes of weather events that bring heavy rain to unaccustomed areas…

Barley production – 2022
Country	Millions of tonnes
Russia	23.4
France	11.3
Germany	11.2
Canada	10.0
Turkey	8.5
Spain	7.0
World	154.9[44]

Seventy percent of barley goes to animal feed which vegetarians would answer is a wasteful way for humans to raise protein, but the other thirty percent is eaten (or drunk) by humans but if climate change disrupts the crop, will animal feed be the first to succumb to unpredictability with humans feeding directly on whatever has managed to be grown?

With barley being eaten in such a wide range of countries, there are many varieties of soups, stews, gruels and porridges not to mention bread made from barley flour. But barley is also fermented to produce malt which is the sugar basis of both many beers and of whisky and these liquids are ascribed as the gifts to mankind of John Barleycorn who was the subject of many ballads variously personifying the harvest and transformation of barley into booze…

Healthwise, a 100-gram portion of barley can provide 10% of the required Daily value of some essential nutrients – fibre, the B vitamin niacin, and dietary minerals, including iron and manganese. It does however contain gluten so it is not suitable for those who are gluten-intolerant. It can aid in the regulation of both blood sugar and blood pressure.

Barley is not the only crop which is and will increasingly suffer from climate change, but it illustrates clearly the coming doom scenario if we fail to act to halt the slide into global warming.

And so to today’s poem – a recently coined form – a Bop poem! The Bop was created by Afaa Michael Weaver during a summer retreat of the African American poetry organization, Cave Canem. The Poets.org defines the Bop as “The first stanza (six lines long) states the problem, and the second stanza (eight lines long) explores or expands upon the problem. If there is a resolution to the problem, the third stanza (six lines long) finds it. If a substantive resolution cannot be made, then this final stanza documents the attempt and failure to succeed.”  So here goes…

Barley

Barley enjoys a cool climate but not too much rain
but global warming also means increased precipitation,
we may have to eschew John Barleycorn’s barley malt
but losing liquor is the least of it if climate change can’t halt.
this oldest of grains is still the fourth most cultivated crop
so food for animals and people around the world might stop.

Animals eat seventy percent of the barley.
Some know only soup with Pearl Barley
but bred to lose its hull is Hull-less Barley
which pre-cooked and dried is Quick Cooking Barley,
longer to cook is only lightly polished Pot Barley,
similar to steel-cut oats are Barley Grits,
and like rolled oats, Barley Flakes are flattened bits
of a grain that’s eaten in so many places
its crop loss with hunger will over-face us.

The third stanza of a Bop poem seeks resolution
but I see no solution to this sad situation,
those traders in stocks and shares
who seek to hedge their bets with grown wares
will find Soft Commodities have and make bad Futures
if we’ve tipped the climate past the point of rupture…

© Andrew Wilson, 2024

Other Commodities beginning with B include Beef and Bitumen. Beef, as is discussed with Barley above, is the least efficient way of producing protein of all animals since you have to put masses of other protein in to get there and as well, cattle are accused of contributing to greenhouse gasses and thus global warming with all their farting and burping methane. There are some minor measures which are beginning to alleviate those things but more significant is that the demand for beef continues to grow and that means bringing more land into agriculture including forestry. Just because people in developed countries want to eat more meat and don’t directly see the Amazon rainforest being cut down to make way for ranching, does not mean it is not affecting them through climate change. You can read a good article by the World Resources Institute weighing up the factors around beef and the environment here.

Bitumen is a byproduct of refining crude oil – the very last item to come out of fractional distillation and it is of course, the binder in tarmac or asphalt which makes the roads that the petrol-driven motor cars drive on. If bitumen was not used up in this way then it would be a horrendous waste product to be disposed of. So the growth of the motor car and the spreading of roads were pretty much synchronised and conversely, if – and it is a big if – we transition fully to electric vehicles, then the cessation of oil refining will mean a cessation of bitumen availability and considering that electric vehicles will still need roads… As a commodity, bitumen is pretty closely allied to the cost of crude oil and the price of that is a whole other can of worms!

Other poetry forms I might have chosen beginning with B include the Ballad, the Blazon (though it might be difficult to frame Barley as the beloved), Blank Verse, and the Ballat.