One last time

 One last time 

John Clare Stokes 

By the time word arrived of Angeline's passing

Long past the drying of the aqua foam crosses laced with baby's breath and lilies 

Fading in the Mt Trial Primitive sand

The little white boy could not understand

How they quietly got Sister Donaldson to glory

So he prayed for some angels with hell to pay.

From her pomade doo a boy in Sopchoppy is running

beneath white sheets on the clothesline to hide

Chasing him out of Mrs Clara Jeans clean parsonage.

Down at Langton's IGA cries a boy for a toy

While out in Buckhorn the Mt Trial sisters shout for joy

But not the panting figure hiding in the black cemetery

For he is pleading, 

Oh once again chase me

Chase me from the clean parsonage Angeline

Chase me with your red

Butcher knife just one last time.

Women who run with wolves

 She who run with the wolves

Dances not with Kevin Costners

Women who run with wolves

Lay on sheepskin beds

She who run with wolves

Slow male wolves down

Women who run with wolves 

Usually look like dogs

When i see the blood

 When I see the blood

I never could quite grasp

This desire for the kill

Perhaps in my lost mind

I missed some basic principles

Of the blessing

I was Not Esau enough

Not possessing the proper feel

as I kneeled beside the death bed

My mother never covering me in

Venison skin

Smooth flesh not blessing 

And so I never got it

Never had the smear of blood

To cover me

A lost soul in the deer woods.

Shed

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 give up

 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....

Thursday PT

 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. 

Rick

Rick Bringger is coming to take me to Home Depot to get the roof panels for the shed. We usually have lunch on Wednesdays but he has to take his wife to the doctor. Nice to have a friend. 

Rick came and we got the materials. I mainly raked and threw old stuff away today. Did not work on roof.

The first morning glory bloomed today. Locked keys in car and could not find spare. Finally found it in shed hanging. 

Low the lake

 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 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....

State of things

 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. 

Emily outside after an all nighter.

This is the one I thought missing 

A dream within a dream

 One of my favorites 

Nemesis

 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.

Echoes of Theron

 Echoes of Theron 

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.