Escorts

 Escorts and Greeters 

Keeping the skeeters

At bay

Keeping me company

Along my way

The slivered light

 The slivered light

The first light of dawn 

Breaking through the mist

Comes as a morning gift

As we lift in song

A praise for the day given

As a friend so well says

To be again among the living.

The cattle know

 The cattle know

It’s not of the natural order for

These metal Cheetahs who speed

Upon the grey hard trail

To slow and watch them grazing

It sends them stampeding

Escaping this threat

As down the asphalt trail

Comes another cheetah

Honking his terrible call

Move on! Move on!

Cheetahs do not pause

We are made for speed.

Escape route

 Escape route

I tried to rouse you

Your escape route

was taking off

You said, let me sleep in

I’m in no shape for

Escaping.

Blindside

 Blindside

I could not see the tree for the no see Um’s 

But it seems it was all in my vision

For I was told, it’s as clear as any autumn 

day, why do you see bugs, when there are none?

Farewell

 Farewell to frog

You thought the lake was inclusive

Big enough to hide you in

All was swell in this lovely swamp

Why it’s such a nice day for sunning.

Beauty be not

 Beauty-be not caused-It Is-

Chase it, and it ceases-

Chase it not, and it abides-

Overtake the Creases

In the Meadow- when the Wind

Runs his fingers thro’ it-

Deity will see to it

That You never do it-

Emily Dickinson 

c.1862

Gulf Fritillary among the iron weed

Before the fall

 Before the fall

John Clare Stokes

We envision ourselves forever with the young

The race we can still line up and run

And maybe some are given feet ever strong

Others, we are just grateful to limp home. 

Little Shoals

Suwannee

Upon slipping on the slippery rocks and having to crawl up the bank and limp back to the vehicle

Fields of summers all

 fields of summer's all

by john clare stokes 

in the fallow fields of fall

there lies a long lost ball

kicked over the goal of old

when the uprights were two

and the boys I am told

were measured by feat

but tonight around the

trampled tiger head

we name the fallow field

after the one

who lost the ball

took to alcohol

sat beside the Madden

Super ones

and to Jesus late

did come

So future bums

who make it big

can gather round

the purple tiger

and aspire

to have a fallow field

named for them.

October over

 October over

The month of birth and death is gone

Into November we are moving on 

Time for the cane grinding to begin

time to guard the persimmons ripening

from the nocturnal possums 

time to boil the Mason jars for the syrup

time to check the Gravely for stale gas 

Making sure it still cranks on

Thanksgiving morning

time to send someone down to the IGA

for the pancake batter and bacon

we don’t want to subsist upon cereal

when the time comes

The glory

 And so I rest within 

the glory

And let the light

tell it's story

In the dark

of the cold wilt

To despair the

tendrils tilt

Still, still we dwelt

For the light felt

The opening of the glory

The entering of rest.

John Clare Stokes

Martins mail

 Martins mail

John Clare Stokes 

Martins Taylor of route seven

When was the last time

You checked your mail?

That moon you ordered

Arrived at last

The song you needed

Came 

The paperboy even

Delivered the good news

For a change

Martins Taylor

Check your mailbox

O November

 O November

John Clare Stokes

How long has it been in the turning of the mill

that in the back yard rests in the November chill

And who shall turn when alas the sons are gone

Will the one once known come to carry on?

Ogden Road

 Ogden Road treatise 

Seems I’d keep the Suwannee scene long

It was my favorite scene i said

And the poem was one particularly fond 

But neither inspired or led

To the heights I dreamed

It so seems I dwell in a land alone

Those tell me do not post these scenes

And so I do not seek the places drawn

The joy of inspiration it brings

They are tucked deep within the confines 

I shall not help the blind again see

They will just have to grope darkly.

No crows

 Outer Limits

Through no fault of my own doing 

Yet then from all the fault of my doing

The crows have deemed me outer limits

No matter the signals of peace sent

Crows know faces and it’s my thought

one was watching the day the rooster died

and he flew to tell the murder of the deed

A fate awaiting them should they near 

I feign to imagine what other deeds they’ve seen

Telling the crow world of one so craven

Perhaps I shall wear a mask when in the yard

Attract them again in some future new generation 

But they pass on the story to the offspring 

The cock crows thrice and I am cowering.

Long distance voyager

 The well-prepared long distant voyager...while this photograph was taken on Low Lake Road in the early eighties....it could have been taken thirty years later...for little changed...the same bike...the same shorts, shoes and jersey,huret mileage counter on the front wheel, mirror, pockets full of tools and snacks...the only piece of equipment updated was the helmet....and it too was dated….Roger Sessler was an icon to me and so many....never changing...always there....faithful....a friend.

Ole Camp C

 Between two fires

John Clare Stokes

We once were among those

Who spent their autumn days

between two fires

Of Alfred and his tall tales

the Fugates and Smiths with 

the old upright in between

in harmony we would sing

as the hounds would join in

for that evening 

all would chase the venison.

Moon ache

Moon ache

John Clare Stokes

How many years shall it take

to heal the everlasting moon ache

Years the waxing and waning arches 

over the prayers pleas and petitions

Silently in a nonchalant cold aloof way

the moon sets yet the ache goes not away.

Low Lake Sunday

 Low the lake

We were on our way from forty-nine...upon the intersection of Low Lake and Bulb Farm roads...the old Spanish style church was still standing....eventually crossing US90 and going into Wellborn...stopping at the Jiffy Store for the drink and ice cream...Roger would catch up on his girls....he knew all the clerks.....Bob and I would lag behind...Roger kept an up tempo pace on the Vitus....I had the yellow Cannondale...Bob the Super Sport Schwinn....we finished up at Bob's no A/C trailer off Turner Road in Lake City...it was a typical Sunday afternoon ride of over forty-nine miles to forty-nine and back....Roger like the church no longer stands…the  Jiffy now closed and the girls gone...Bob... was lost in a world of fading memory...making it to age ninety…..mostly spending  his last days reminiscing...along with me at past seventy and rapidly  keeping their pace....

Downy

 Downy Boy

I think if I were with wings

I would not be affiliated

With the pileated 

His fiery, flamboyant red

His constant cackling

Nor the crow

A know it all

Nor the red-tail hawk

Again

Always having to squawk 

And I feign to diss

Their purpose

Their ways are just not for me

And I'd be hard pressed

To find a bird that's best

Perhaps the Downy

Not too showy 

Just a tad of red

Common and looks like a miniature hairy

Of which I am not

Often mistaken for a 

Sapsucker 

Who drill the parallel

Holes in living trees

To feed on sap that

Drips so gewey 

Or perhaps a turkey

But not a Jake or a Tom

Always looking for some

Oh, just little, quiet 

Downy!