No more will fields of cotton or corn stalks wave
Where winds of progress sow their seed
Generations weep the sweat they gave
Betrayed by faceless corruption and greed
~~
Agrarian ways sold to the highest bidder
Weakened by a nations diminished resolve
Ill effects they fail to consider
Of a livelihood they so nonchalantly dissolve
~~
Our sustenance awarded to foreign lands
No thought given to our founding traditions
So many necessities taken out of our hands
Forcing this debtor nation into submission
~~
John Deere once green sits plagued with rust
Barns and silos like monuments sit vacant
Conglomerate farmers betraying our trust
Their harvests destined for the seafront
~~
Farms and fields are no longer held sacred
Mere property to be bartered, bought and sold
Paid not to plant so many acres left arid
There is more money in building homes we are told
~~
We’ve sold off our future for a profit it seems
Self-sufficiency a thing of the past
Our founders would tremble at the love of excess we deem
Prized more highly than that which will last
~~
The road on which we travel is a perilous one its true
Its course for our own sake we must alter
Lack of fortitude to do what we know we must do
To a second place status we will falter
~~ D. R. DiFrancesco ~~
Dom DiFrancesco 
This poem is very thought provoking and accurate. I live in a rural area and many of my neighbours are farmers, they feel life has become tougher, land agents are giving them a hard time and supermarkets are making it almost impossible for them to earn a living. They work so hard all year through and every year gets harder.
As you say it has gotten harder for them and I find it sad to see so many family farms either being sold for some form of development or sold to huge corporate agriculture companies. I see it happening where I live. I used to have to drive past field after field of cotton and alfalfa, but now they are either empty unplanted fields or housing developments. Thankfully there are still a few left, but unfortunately most of these have for sale signs on them. I know that we live in a world of constant change, yet I’m not sure that change is always good.
Someday – maybe a day or two too late, unfortunately – people will realize we can’t eat concrete, nor can a prefab corrugated roof ever afford the dappled shade of a tree. Someday …
Here, here! That was really the point of the poem. Unfortunately I think we are already too late to change the path we are traveling on.