"The Cross Eye"
But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord. 2 Cor. 3:18
Photographed off the back porch, the reflection of the cross in the eyes. Even the lowest creature bears witness.
John Clare Stokes
It's a painful thing
This pull to reclaim
The works of man
We hew the pew
From the oak
Sew the curtain
From the cotton
Then comes the briar
The branch
The worm
To reclaim its own
We held so long
The burning of the
Slow pulling rope
Stings
Taking men's things
Across the line
Winning every time.
Verbenadale Church
Williston
John Clare Stokes
Tell us a mystery
I shall tell you one
How opened upon
The old pulpit dusty
Dry bones long dead
Began to tremble
And then assemble
When words were read
Come forth His cry
You army of bones
To Zion march on
Ye shall not die
What a mystery!
In the first year of his reign, in the first month, he opened the doors of the house of the LORD and repaired them.
Good lesson for me. What is entering the door of my heart, through my eyes, into my thoughts? What filth do I harbor deep within the temple?
It took sixteen days for the priests and the Levites to cleanse the temple. May the work upon my doors begin today!
john clare
each day
she would pray
give us this day
our daily bread
each night
she would write
in her diary
thank you humbly
for the bread
today
but mostly
she dreamed
it would be
Zaxby's
for daily bread
is good
and give thanks
she would
but every now and then
she would amend
her prayer to begin
thanking the Lord
for a son
who would come
and say
mamma
lets give thanks today
for some Zaxby's.
Would cause you
To come to me
All skinny in halter
Top hippy
Long flower twined
Hair falling revealing
Just the edge of
Flesh not tan
Cruel muse to
Send me back
Before the sag
Caught up.
John Clare Stokes
Between the final act of life
(Of what is left of it)
Save for the five-minute smoke break
(At intermission )
Lungs shot to hellacious
Forgotten chain-sucking Thespian
The lines of the Bard mumbled,
"Nor moody beggars, starving for a
time, of pell-mell havoc and confusion".
The disengaged,sullen orderly wheels
Henry the fourth
off stage to room five b with
The drawn curtains,
(Yellowed-fingers tremble)
Bed bound the encore call cord
beyond reach,
O'er and o'er the lines lipping
"O the ignominy sleep with thee in
the grave, but not remember'd in
Thy epitaph!"
In thy epitaph!
john clare
Sunday
there were several
empty seats
where Megan and family
once sat
quietly watching
while sister went under
it did sink into her
for she went to Indiana
baptized by daddy
while one with her perm
i imagine was squirming
in her front row seat
hoping she too
would not have to go
under
wetting her nice do
combed so lovingly
by Megan.
Sat across the aisle
Where she talked continual
From Lawton to Dallas.
Today is my ‘last’ day as an automobile photographer. I will probably miss those circle scenes, the backing with the colliding involved, but in these times, three years is long enough. I’d like to thank Ray Carpenter Ray Carpenter who taught me everything I know about AUTO photography, and especially shooting in MANUAL AUTOS. Peace outback in the Chevy field somewhere.
July 30.2022
Three years ago my good friend Ray Carpenter saw me coming out of Baya to get into my vehicle from being fired. He didn’t know they had let me go but offered me a job taking photos of vehicles for the web pages of the dealers. Three years later we find out the photo department locally of Ray, his son and I are being outsourced by a company starting Monday. Well, though I didn’t need to, for the two weeks I kept the log Ray, the boss, asked us to. In other words, I stayed true even though I didn’t have to.
Only thing I can say is, though I trust I was a good employee, it’s very important who you hire. They can ultimately cause you to be…outsourced. Peace out.
This was 2022. They didn’t get rid of me but made me a driver of cars. Ray and son they let go. I stayed on til my stroke last year.
John Clare Stokes
When Sabeans maul
When fire falls from heaven
When Chaldeans storm
When great winds come
When one escapes to tell
When grief is poured
When in dust you dwell
Blessed will be the name
Of the Lord still.
John Clare Stokes
We who once dwelt in Iston
Think of it always so
We never see it in its
Completeness
As those who remain see it
When we approach from
Far Onson and the tower
Is nearing
As we top the hill
We expect to still see
Those familiar scenes
Stretching down Noble
Each time passing
Beneath the Iston
Something is missing
Many places replaced
But mostly empty space
Leaving us to fill in the
Blanks
We do not linger
For we who once dwelt
It's painful
To those who came after us
History is unknown
In need of tearing down
Moving on
And we do
Sadly amid the
Exultant
John Clare Stokes
The iron butterfly soared
Upon the wind
Down from the red mountain
The chimes of heaven
Tinkling
Don’t you know I’ll
Always be true?
Only in a seventeen minute span
Plummet to earth
Cast drunken, a windless tangle
From an
In-a-gadda-da-In the garden of Eden
John Clare Stokes
The iron butterfly soared
Upon the wind
Down from the red mountain
The chimes of heaven
Tinkling
Don’t you know I’ll
Always be true?
Only in a seventeen minute span
Plummet to earth
Cast drunken, a windless tangle
From an
In-a-gadda-da-vida.
In the year 68 the Iron Butterfly came out with 17 minute song and we drove over to the Subterranean Circus head shop on 10 South Main in Dreamsville, Hogtown or Gainesville to get the vinyl. We got home and put it on the family console, taking off the Perry Como, laid on the carpet and turned the volume way up, for our parents were not home yet. We were no longer rednecks from Williston but hard rockers. Or so we imagined.
John Clare Stokes
And in the first evening
Came the six as one
Each to his own direction
By the morning of the second
To one vision they turned
A bouquet for the new day
For by the evening of the third
The glory of the gathered
But a memory of the first bloom
The Ceylon Swamp Lily
Crinum Zeylanicum
Mostly it’s just the rake
and me
Out in the back alone
doing a semblance
of a waltz among
the pine needles
she is so lithe in my touch
Anticipating my every move
Oh she’s been all
I’ve ever imagined
It’s a merciful thing
to sweep with a rake
A fellow could die
from all the leaves
he was dancing with
Vision can be such a difficult thing
One can be impatiently pointing
Exasperated you cannot see
The obvious hidden in the trees
Have compassion upon we the blind
To our dimness be kind
God didn’t give me eagle vision
But big ears
For listening
In vain I tried to convince her
As the Prince emerged
From the magic stone
The end of your woes has come
You can leave that Chiefland apartment
Why have a castle upon a Utah mountain
if you want
Eat at the Gathering Buffet everyday
But lo
It was all for naught
She couldn’t get beyond
Kissing the frog.
John Clare Stokes
It’s a kind of world
One could grow fond of
Wolves and coyotes joining
Stars in their brightest twinkle
Prayers it seems come easier
Distractions yet to awaken
John Clare Stokes
Like Frosty the Snowman
I long for some magic
In the old pith hat
My father once wore
To work the bee hives
To weed the acre pea rows
Below Wakulla County skies
And how the gardens would grow
There is now so much I do not know
So little that I can remember
The crepe myrtles need pruning
The Christopher lilies aren’t blooming
But am I even in the right season?
I rub the old pith hat
Bend to separate the clustered bulbs
An ever slight hint of fall
Is in the hot Florida air
I pray for another snow
as in eighty-nine
so I can build again my father
and place upon him
his old beekeepers pith hat
I know there must be some
magic in.
John Clare Stokes
Sabbath sunrise where he once sat
sins weight upon his back
to rise and deliver the word
from empty chairs yet heard
Echoing words from the watchman
lifting up one voice
together they sang for joy
eye to eye they saw
the return of the Lord to Zion.
Sabbath sunset where I sit
sins weight pressing yet
rise up my son to find
eyes and eyes upon Zion
Where the Methodist church now is on the left was once Mr Emory and Mrs Mary’s home. The magnolia tree over hanged the front porch. Across the street was the Sopchoppy River.
Time was we’d abandon
all caution of moccasins
or bull gators lurking
in the late evening wind
to wade right out into heaven
Tenting tonight
On the old camp ground
Lightening bugs all around
Not a sound
save the thousand mosquitoes
drowning the chorus of cicadas
john clare
Whenever I visit a cemetery
the first place I check
are the four corners
to see who got the compass plots
Joe Kirby in the black Bethel
got the Western spot.
The pace is too rapid
In front the rainbow
To the rear rays
Astride the twisting up
Crows overhead
Mockingbird's below
Battery low
Resolution lower
On down the day goes
Jeopardy within
And Alex has a cold
