71

 Sixty nine from Sopchoppy 

john clare stokes

One is for Bluefield,WV from where I was born,

Uncle Kermit driving mamma that January 30th in the snow storm.

Two is for coming from Vicco in

Kentucky to Sopchoppy in a Packard.

Three is for Mrs Mary and her bread pudding

Four is for Angeline and her red butcher knife

Robert,Sam and me running for our lives.

Five is for my Uncles in Mississippi staying summers happily

Six is for first loves, first grades and Helen Roussey from Panacea

Seven is for John Lloyd crying loudly 

Miss Townsend saying I'd be moving

Eight is for Monticello and Lewis being born

Nine is for leaving the loved two story Victorian parsonage 

Ten is for returning to Kentucky at Asbury in Wilmore

Eleven is for walking April Wells her answer I will forever be waiting for

Twelve is for the long 7th grade journey to Williston

Not believing Bill and Jack were not grown men

Thirteen is for JV Football and long haul fast end sweeping

Fourteen is for down by the Blue Grotto Melissa meeting

Fifteen is for playing point guard with the brothers

Sixteen and finding that Purple Haze a lot of love covers

Seventeen is for the Red Devil Class of seventy- three

Eighteen is for the perfect GPA at Santa Fe

Nineteen is for George Amica and working at Williston Memorial 

Twenty is for Catherine Wilson singing Healing Love gloriously 

Twenty one is for living with Dr ZT Johnson at Asbury

The F in Spanish and returning to Williston sadly 

Twenty two is for the painting the hospital walls a second time

Daddy saying, we can pay for college by cutting the pines 

Twenty three is for repeating a Junior year at Florida Southern

Twenty four for earning a BA degree finally.

Twenty five is for working as a service writer at Powers with Frankie

To turn down a job in Monticello teaching art convincing me

Twenty six is for wanting badly a photojournalist my career spending

Twenty seven is for Lucille and Lynn Counts hiring me to change mannequins at JCP

Twenty eight is for running 10k's with Forrest and Buddy

Twenty nine is for winning the city logo contest soundly.

Thirty is for canoeing the Suwannee with Bob Jones

Thirty one is for running the first marathon 26.2 miles long 

Thirty two is for meeting a nurse at Shands named Melanie

Thirty three Jesus died but in Whitehurst chapel we were married 

Thirty four and to our garage apartment on Camp came Landon

Mrs Beverly a job in JCP management offering

Thirty five is for that suit I now wore all the time

Thirty six is for Alan Crews his home on Camp selling

Thirty seven is for the Alachua General coming of Jordon

Thirty eight is for jumping on the trampoline under the pecan 

Thirty nine is for the stucco house outgrowing

Forty is for postman Brian and to his Tevis house moving 

Forty one is for winning nationally and to Dallas awarding sending

Forty two is for Rick Bringger and Hambone putting up with me

Forty three is for not taking the job in Albany

Forty four is for staying with family and friends in Lake City

Forty five is for letting Valerie take the job in Ocala

She wanting out of town so badly

Forty six and that sick feeling after telling Calise to chill

Forty seven is for that Friday in April 

I can see it still

We are letting you go, with a gold retiree card

Twenty percent off a tad too hard

Forty eight is for Russell coming to Westside Chapel

Forty nine is for voting with Tom Bart not to build that Grace Babel

Fifty is for Ruth Garner hiring me at Sears

Fifty one and the Weasel is the top commissioned salesman to no cheers 

Fifty two is for the coming end of biking centuries with Roger Sessler

Fifty three is for lamenting the loss of Bobs memory in his nineties

Fifty four is for one last River Run

Fifty five is for the sudden Sears closing 

Fifty six is for the coming of my Grandson Nathaniel Manoa

Fifty seven is for Bill Giebeig hiring me to read meters slowly

Fifty eight is for continual prayer for Landon and family 

Fifty nine is for volunteering down at the gallery

Sixty was for dreaming of being once again in ole Sopchoppy.

Sixty one for driving the Baya van delivering beds and oxygen, then driving to Homewood to Uncle William Clark’s funeral

Sixty two the saddest year for losing my mother

on the day before her 89th birthday.

Sixty three for son Jordon in Korea in the Army

Praying for his safety monitoring the DMZ.

Sixty four for being fired for taking photos then being hired by Ray the same day to take photos.

Sixty five for retiring in a Covid crazed world, while under Biden we downwards swirled.

Sixty six was for becoming a porter of cars, never dreamed I’d end up not going this far.

Sixty seven was for losing Uncle Jimmy in Mississippi, the last of the Stokes brothers missed greatly.

Sixty eight was for a vacation with Melanie and Jordon, Roscoe too in the cold Carolina mountains freezing.

Sixty nine and will this be at last the year, family so long missed will once again come near?

Seventy and a stroke set me back to learn again how to run. But I did return to the Gateway Gallery. 

Seventy one, here I come.