Are you ready, my shoulder!

Rise up, my arm!

Blow upon my face,

Wind of midday!

The epigraph is from "The Mower" (1836) by Aleksey Koltsov, known for his poetry on rural landscapes and peasant labor.

Here, Tchaikovsky objectively captures the popular life of a summer village. This depicts the ritualistic task of collectively mowing grass in the fields to make hay for livestock, a season preceding the harvest.

From the simple main melody, with its emphasized downbeats, one might envision people vigorously swinging their scythes forward while singing work songs. The contrasting minor-key middle section seems to evoke the arduous labor in the hot July fields and a sudden gust of wind blowing through them—perhaps this interpretation is too speculative?