Bloody Mary

 Beware

Crazy Mary 

That rouge made

Face with 

Plastered on

Smile

Hides much guile

And if you gaze

Her way

She will say

It's sexually

You harass her

Look away

From

crazy Mary.

Emily

 We thirst at first—'tis Nature's Act...

It intimates the finer want—

Whose adequate supply

Is that Great Water in the West—

Termed Immortality—

~ Emily Dickinson 

Orange messenger

Orange messenger 

For most of the day

The orange pennant

Hovered and followed 

near

As if to either tell me

something

Or maybe nothing

That he just took a notion

To hang out with me

Thanks Orange pennant

I needed you

Up the holler

 Up the holler

There was the time when

the differences in worship 

were pretty easy to define 

A Sunday ride up the holler

We’d find the structures along

the narrow winding road

Culminating with the Methodists

high above the Primitives

by the trickling coal strewn creek

and in between the Presbyterian 

and the baptist with a Pentecostal 

for good measure 

there weren’t any mega structures

obscuring the Mountain View

no third Baptist’s from the latest split

few of the latter day or Jehovah such

or the Saturday sabbath two or three

Pretty much what was along the way

was all we needed in the day.

Frame lane

 Frame Lane

We all have our memory lane, a special place or time we hold dear. I happen to have many, too many perhaps to keep me from entering the present freeway, sitting on the side of some fairy way. Happy the traveler who has his well laid present paths and who need not dwell long upon the road once taken.

Other side of the tracks

 Other side of the tracks

Johnclarestokes 

I always wanted to live near the tracks

Just on the other side 

Down a narrow, winding lane

Hear the coming of the long train.

Lee, Florida

US90

The Secret Stables

 The Secret Stables

Johnclarestokes 

There are secret stables waiting

For rides of imagination

Winking

Blinking 

Nod

All saddled and shod

Gentle ones 

Unbridled

No blinkers

Winkers

Or stirrups needed.

Brown Street

Mists missed

 In the quiet mist...I cannot quite convey...How much we miss...This earthly place....I'm told and told...This is not home....Look for streets of gold....Well, they never knew…Give me Homewood of old...The heart pine porch....A simple creaking swing....Smoke house aroma pouring forth....And in heaven I sang.....

The budding wood

 The budding wood 

Johnclarestokes 

From trees of life grafted in

Eastward out of Eden's garden

Planted in the holy sanctuaries 

To forever bud anew

Growing into psalm upon psalm in song

Wood fit for the Master's whittling

In the cool of the eternal evening.

Falling Creek formerly Methodist church

Full moon

 My sister asked me for a pic of the moon. So i went out the road and took several. Downloaded. She thought i sent a fake!

DYI

 The reciprocal saw needed a new cord. I used a cord off an ancient drill that was frozen. It works. 

Ole Homewood

 Old Homewood

John Stokes

On this October 16th, Rev Luther Ray Stokes birthday.

The coming November turning of the mill

Around old Homewood the family collecting

Traveling to gather for the syrup making

To Thanksgiving blueberry pancakes waking.

Hear the old yellow Gravely powering up

Setting the wheels upon the circling path

Warm to the rabbit burners kerosene drip

Soon to boil the juices hop and skip.

Face aglow he adjusted the burners flame

As buckets of juice into the kettle came

At sixty gallons we stopped the squeezing 

To begin the boiling juices skimming.

Nearing noon the right specific gravity

Down to ten gallons the syrup beginning to candy

Quickly we quenched the flame and dipped

Through muslin the amber poured and bottled.

Then we would give thanks around the mill

In the sugar shack tables were filled

And we would pray this would always be

The making of old Homewood with friends and family.