MrsFlorida

 Mrs Florida 

My earliest and richest memories to this day reside in Sopchoppy, my first eight years in Florida. We spent many Sundays at Mrs Florida Morrison Roberts(1883-1976) home with her son Bonny Kaslo”BK”, (1907-1999)Florida Supreme Court Justice and his sister Inez Yent(1902-1993)wife of Florida Attorney General. I was most fortunate to have many matronly mothers in my early life. Mrs Florida’s , husband,Thomas(1877-1949) was the railroad clerk and merchant. They married in 1899. I would get out her button up shoes and try them on her, pretending I was a salesman. She had a feather down mattress on which I slept. Mamma and Paula and I would go to her house and stay during hurricanes, though her wooden cracker house was less sturdy than our concrete block house. She kept up writing to us up until her death.

Gather the shadow

 since it has been going on thirteen Novembers 

his shadow remembers and lingers

in the long Still Road S curve

just down from where we slowed

to recall Judy and her crooked tree

lingering we knew

awaiting our journey by

lately it seems more are the shadows

awaiting our passing

patient along the still roads 

stepping out beside the

long Taylor way to wave

as mirages upon the hot 

asphalt

over the Interstate hill

beckoning us to please wait

under the lone persimmon

letting them catch up

only to spin beyond our sight

determined to make Moniac

for some invisible reward

of being the first to greet 

us as the shadows gather in

front of the single store on 

the way to nowhere

and prepare

for the tracing of the route

back to the long Still Road 

S curve

to greet Judy and gather

the shadow waiting 

patiently...

With wind gone

 With wind gone

Johnclarestokes 

Calm gentle

Relentless wind

Weathering fading smoothing

The long leaf heart pine

We patch

We paint 

We mend

But still blows the

Calm gentle

Relentless wind

The second

The minute

The year

The wind cares not

For the time

Rise to face it 

Make a stand for 

Eighty and nine until

The nuptial knotted threshold

Wears thin to lie at last

In piles of tinder

And it comes

Calm gentle

Relentless wind

To ignite and scatter

The august memory.

The Canoeist

 The Canoeist

After John Cheever’s short story, The Swimmer

By john stokes 

Like revelations that come to sages on exiled islands, it dawned upon him what he must do. He would canoe across the county. That cold November morning that had killed his beloved glories, he pulled the Old Town from the racks. The royalex no longer made, it fell  with a rocking to the dirt. It was the sixteen foot Chipewan model,originally bright yellow, now a dull green from multiple spray painted coatings, with a mostly yellow bottom showing through the scrape marks. He had secured the canoe from an abandoned garage, rescuing it from a long forgotten dry docking, giving it new seats and yoke. Heaving it overhead, with the Bending Branches bent wooden paddle lashed to the thwart, purchased by him from funds his few loyal employees raised for him on his sudden Friday April firing, ending nineteen years denying the Golden Rule,he portaged over to Paul's pool, leaf free unlike his, chlorine mists stinging his vision. Like many of his neighbors, he only knew him by first name. He knew he drank beer and talked loudly on his cell phone was about the extent of his knowledge. And he wasn't home. He was glad to exit this unimaginative rectangular pond and portaged his route downhill to Lenvil Dicks pond which spilled over into the Price Creek. He thought of the times he and his estranged son,now in Japan, fished along the banks, and he hurried to exit this area of the stabbing shallows to the cool creek. Once in the shade of this twisted way, he got as far as old Country Club road before having to hurry across, dodging the rapid moving, like a possum on the highway.With  thanks given to Buck Hill for digging his series of dikes in the sixties, he at last made his way into the big  lake called Alligator, named for the old Seminole chief who once made his home where now the upper crust dwelt along the high side roam.

He paddled with his favorite j-stroke in long pull and twist the wrist turns, able to keep to the left gunnel, tracking a straight line. At the end of Alligator by the Tiger stadium, a creek trickled out which eventually formed Clay Hole Creek, some water yet remaining from the summer falls which flooded some residents,blaming the County.  They said in the ancient of days this was once a continual river all the way down to the Itchetucknee. No longer. Forgoing  the blame, it was a continual disembark and pull affair. This was one reason he preferred the canoe over the kayak. The getting in and out. With a long series of repeats, he entered Rose Creek, which he transversed west, taking the right fork at 133 to the headwaters. He was near High Falls, though he never found a fall, surmising there was once a fall long ago or perhaps it was a hippy hangout. His longest portage faced him as he crossed hayfield and bogs below Lulu to Olustee Creek, which designated the lower border of his county. A deeper tannic color, his only obstacles were the many fallen trees replete with hornet nests and banana spiders. It was an arduous paddle, which tested his resolve, but he was too far southward to turn back. And if to add insult to his misery, when he finally made it to O'Leno Park, the stream abruptly went underground in a whirlpool. Another long portage through swamps of moccasin and ticks loomed. When the river appeared again at River Rise, he was now on the clear Santa Fe, a wide, navigable dream of a river. It made the long series of hardships worth the journey. From then on, it was a joy to float along, tracing the southernmost contours and bends, padding past July Spring, Hollingsworth bluff, Wilson Springs and finally to the point where the Itchetucknee's clear water  met the Santa Fe tea. Though nearing sixty, a washed up shell of his former vigor, he knew his journey across county was complete. But even in his weakened, near delirious state, he was loathe to call it quits. He was tired of calling it quit, of having others call it quit for him on Friday's! No, this day he would call the quits, he would find a worth far beyond the arbitrary worthlessness placed upon him. 

So on that cold and uneventful Friday in November, with the memory of his wilted morning glories still stinging, the Canoeist continued on for the Suwannee. He would make the Gulf eventually, his once Popeye like left forearm turning the J-stroke into the current.

With wind gone

 

Never more roar

 

From Deborah to April

 Ring around the Rosie

When we were young

we all held hands and

spun round and round

til to the end we’d come

and we’d all fall down

the last child to fall

would have to tell

who their love was

it mortified me

to have to tell openly

the one I secretly adored

n’er occurring I could

have said my mother

my grandmother 

anyone but the one

who sat across from me

whom I got caught by

Mrs Floyd trying to pass

a note to her

finally mustering courage

with my yes, no, maybe

please check note 

so relieved the note was 

not read cruelly before

the giggling elementary 

and so she never knew

it was me who adored her

secretly for summer came

and as a preachers son

we moved away to Kentucky

far from the game of

ring around the Rosie 

but right to another lovely

who did get my yes, no, maybe

returned with yes, yes, yes

kiss, kiss, kiss, heart, heart, heart

and how if I played that game again

I’d gladly be the last to fall

Just so I could proudly exclaim

she’s the one 

the one named for the forth

month in the year.

Ada Hall

Ada Hall station

Needmore near Deep Creek

US441

Miles from Needmore

The dusk was drawing toward a starry night,

On an endless highway of repetitive pines from Fargo.

Low on fuel, with thoughts of a dreaded hike,

When far ahead, a faint light was pulsing.

Turning off 441 at the humble faded blue store,

A young lady rose from her creaking chair.

"We don't see many travelers stopping anymore,

They are usually rushing on," she said.

With the tank filling, she told of her life,

Of the bee gums sweet in deep creeks,

Of departed beau's sparking her beneath

Oak Grove bouquet's trying to catch.

She could have left the lonely station,

Could have settled for Lake City's grandeur,

But love of home needed no relocation,

The richness in a place of familiarity.

Lovingly she returned the handle of the Chevron,

Inviting us to join her in the rocking.

Not wanting to leave this Needmore enchantment,

The blur of travelers wearily passing called.

Later that night checking into the hotel,

The needle mysteriously showed empty again.

"Why didn't we just fill up back at Miss Elsie's?"

"Elsie Hall?" Inquired the sleepy clerk.

"Yes, the young lady at the Needmore store."

"How could that be?" Miss Elsie passed in

two thousand long after the store closed."

March 21,1919

Sept 1, 2000

Kerr Syrup

 Kerr Syrup

Opened today the

last five jars of the

Old blend

From the long ago

Cooking

Mostly dregs

Daddy said

Still good 

Stirred in the

Ham

Biscuit and eggs

And so they stayed

In the shed

Until today

Poured anew in

The long neck

Bottle

To sit again

 Simply kept

For the sweet

Taste of

Remembering.

Glass Bottom

 Glass Bottom

It was long my secret boyhood dream

Whenever we would peer in the Wakulla clear stream

That when Captain Gavin called for the jumping fish Henry 

He would call up Jane mistakenly

Too fine

 Two fine characters...Harold "historian" Murphy of Lake City and Butch Harrison of Live Oak, Florida Cracker Storyteller at the A Land Remembered tour at the Lake City Library.Harold I knew personally. I miss his stories and friendship. 

Breast high

 Where reeded grass, breast-high and undisturbed,

Forms pleasant clumps, through which the soothing winds,

Soften her rigid fears,

And lull to calm repose.

Autumn by John Clare

Stanza twenty