Sitting here contemplating working on the shed. These torx screws really torx me. They strip out! I need to get some T15 2inch. Slow going. Basically one handed as the right arm weak and the range of motion painful.
The hens about to get on my nerves making holes all over the place.
I post a poem about a gator, i called Leviathan, who haunts the Suwannee, and if i get a response, what is it?
Bloody paw....late nights along Rolines banks...from the murky Suwannee does crawl...the worst of haints...the three pawed leviathan...hissing who took my paw...who took my paw....
Physical Therapy day. Worked on knee. During most of day worked in garden arranging and setting out some amaryllis. Gave up on squash. Some cucumbers may make it. Okra not dying. Strawberries coming along. Marigolds going like gangbusters. Tomatoes all but played out. Trash man picked up several cans of old things. Feels good to have some of accumulation over the years gone. Still much to go. Chickens getting along. Eggs picking up.
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 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...Bob... was lost in a world of fading memory...making it to age ninety…..mostly spending his last days reminiscing...along with me at near seventy and keeping their pace....
Today Monday we are raking and burning leaves and trying to organize. The Melanie’s Place hens are laying, we worked in their pen arranging it. The Chick Inn hen Daphne was laying on the ground last evening. I thought something had gotten her. I put her in her pen and today she seemed fine. Emily of the Driftwood Hens wasn’t on the roost last night. I thought one of the Rhode Island’s was missing. But this morning it was Emily at the door wanting in.
There are few people beyond Democrats i don’t care to be around, but Herb is one of them. You’d think not as he is a fellow photographer. Problem is he is arrogant, elitist and not friendly to me. I dont know why. I’ve had a few others feel the same. I guess we all must have a nemesis.
John Clare Stokes
I walked along the sloping sand
Searching for the impressions of his easel
Holding his painting
Of the Suwannee.
It was here the artists like Theron roamed
Here that I was inexplicably drawn,
To catch but a glimpse of how he mixed the
Ochre and the cobalt
How in the end the blend of earth, God and men were so perfectly wrought.
It was here the tripod marks of Moran remained
When images emerged from
Darkness upon emulsion
The kindom of Kodachrome lasting long after our
Digital transience
The dodge and burn of earth, film and men eternally.
It was here before us all
The Timicuan dwelt
In every rock, tree and ripple their spear marks felt
And so like us, they embarked on downstream
Out into that Gulf immortal
Awaiting for the consummation of man, artistry and Suwannee.
Half past Cheely
John Clare Stokes
Once there was a time upon which you could set your watch in Williston
When Nettie Griffin and later NE would arrive at the Chick Inn
When one of Charlie Lewis angels would be at the dry goods
Mrs Valerie Blackburn would begin painting with her pet mockingbird
Travis Harris would pump some Standard premium for Chubby Pettaway
Doyle Crosby and Rossi Davis would arrive to repair the tube TV
Bruce Smith would grab his racquet from Crabtree’s and head up Noble
When the Seaboard would sound to slow the traffic down
When JH would come walking all about town.
It was time to…
John Clare Stokes
Let me return just once more
to the old Kentucky I’ve longed for
so long, the place of my first dreams
the Jessamine streams and woods
of fall, where we would walk in search
of the rabbits hidden by the slate fences
where we’d sit and rest for a spell
as the long whistle from the coal train
strained the cool air to make it over
the High Bridge into the pristine white
fenced thoroughbred farms where the
Chestnut steeds reposed in lush retirement
while all about the countryside on every barn
wall and driveway, backboards were kept
in top condition, nets unfrayed and white
as into the night, the sounds of swish was
heard, a ritual repeated all across the
commonwealth, the hope in every boy
to be among the number with ole Rupp
and his runts on the hallowed hardwood.
Let me return just once more.
