Sunday friend
The dragonflies are kind
My kind
They like the sun
Aren’t so fearful they flee
When you encroach
Their territory
All eyes
And I’m all ears
Sunday, October 6, 2024
The departing
The departing
John Stokes
In the realm of the kingdom
The departing
A separation
Of spirit and flesh
Lone canoeists
Departing
At our given intervals
Some to Shoals
To Succumb
Some to Gulfs
Distance making
Great clouds of
Boatmen gathering
Rejoining of
Flesh and Spirit
Welcoming the
Ever coming
Canoeists.
Turn back
Turn back
Boarding that Jacksonville Greyhound
Suddenly we were on old Marion
Forty-six and the high school graduate
On her first journey out of Local photographer and artist, John Clare Stokes, created this and shared it recently. We put a lot of time and treasure into keeping up the TG Henderson House. This makes me smile. Thanks, John.
Metaphor for mother
Metaphor for mother
Today i came upon a simple scene
That summed Meme succinctly
The lamp for her late night toiling
The word for her faith never flagging
The desk for her constant writing
The preserves for her cuisine cooking.
To the roaring
Roaring Creek
Flowing to the Suwannee River
To the roaring
They tell me to take them
To the source of the roaring
They ask me
Is it easy to access
Can anyone come to the roaring
And I sigh
For I fear I have revealed a place
Not of roaring
But whispering
In dream
In dream
I’ve been to places
Never seen
Traveled great distance
Without going
Gazed upon strangers faces
Intensely knowing
Won countless races
Pacing ever so slowly
Found love overflowing
In all things lowly
In dream
Yellow flies the time
Yellow fly’s the time
Johnclarestokes
There were long hours spent on the porch
Tin roof shading from the Florida sun
The silence interrupted by the wire swatter
From beneath in sand the ants would come
Carrying below the high porch the silent
ones who moments before sucked blood
The itching persisting into the evening
As the moths circled around the bare
yellow bulb swaying to the rocking
Mosquitoes waking for the evening shift
The fly swatter of little use to defend
bare flesh from the incessant assaults
‘til we’d have to retreat to the front room
the high tongue and groove ceiling above
with the long wire white bulb extinguished
to sleep as the cicadas from sand emerge
to sing the song long into the nocturne
the song of how yellow flies the time
no amount of swat the sting assuage
ever more from Florida sands to swarm.
Mt Pleasant land
Outskirts of Shaker
Past the barns, past the cemetery, Westward from the village. Many traveled,never to return.
Rising
Wendell Berry
Having danced until nearly
time to get up, I went on
in the harvest, half lame
with weariness. And he
took no notice, and made
no mention of my distress.
He went ahead, assuming
that I would follow. I followed,
dizzy, half blind, bitter
with sweat in the hot light.
He never turned his head,
a man well known by his back
in those fields in these days.
He led me through long rows
of misery, moving like a dancer
ahead of me, so elated
he was, and able, filled
with desire for the ground’s growth.
We came finally to the high
still heat of four o clock,
a long time before sleep.
And then he stood by me
and looked, so that my own head
uttered his judgement, even
his laughter. He only said:
“That social life don’t get
down the row, does it, boy?”
Saturday, October 5, 2024
Burning Helene
Today i burned the large pile of brush from Helene. There is still much in back but it will wait until the next hurricane next week.
Cure for the blues
The Bluegrass Way
Nothing would be finer than a slow ride about the Kentucky countryside on a crisp autumn day.
Shaker Village at Pleasant Hill
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