Daubers

 Daubers

John Clare Stokes

In the loft the old volumes found

Long out of print in dusky slow rot

Words gone unread with pages bound

by homes the daubers long forgot.

In the shed the old Briggs chugs

Pull rope frayed, varnished gas 

Fuel lines stopped up with mud

Dauber homes from the past.

In the barn the Columbus cooking vat

Georgia Red cane grinding to a halt

Tobacco barn rabbit burners sputter and spat

it’s tiered rows the daubers sought.

On the porch the bare bulb is dim

We chip and chip for a yellow glow

A muddy mist casts a shadow slim

Keeping daubers warm long ago.

So brilliant were our golden guilds

Forever and ever they would last

But patiently the daubers build

His kingdom clogging, long after

ours is past.

Sandra way

Sandra way

The ground orchids Sandra gave me bloom

Cat in the background with a winter soon

o’er as Litttle boy blue waited for the moon

with the camera he bought in June.

The dancing lilies

 The dancing lilies

In the early chill of the mornings new light

The lilies danced with delight

An inner voice lifted in the breeze

Then replied, yes, your mother sees.

The slow children

 The slow children end their play

Newberry Elementary

When I was a child

I spake as a child

When I was a child

I thought as a child

Wild and unbridled 

When I became a man

They said, lay aside your

Childish ways

Think as a man

Speak as a man

Bland and bridled

But I was slow

I refused to the classroom

To go

Speaking from a

Grown child's 

Point of view....

New town train

 The New Town train

Newberry Elementary

The New Town train came

To take the now tame

To the fields afar

From the confines

Of the blue zoo

One by one

They let them go

But by the next morning

They were yearning

For the blue zoo

Captured again so easily

Boarding sleepy

And docile.

The towering

 The towering road 

Gainesville NW 43rd

Above the towering road

Line upon line

With not a note at all

To hold the sky in

Sound 

Just the steady humming

Coming from 

Crystal River

The giver of our

Note less lines.

The palms embrace

 The palms embrace

The palms embrace

With clouds caress

This meeting of frond and

Wind

The beginning of the

Courting.

Dogwood baying

 Dogwood baying

Travel up the Dogwood trail

Past the mossy field

Into the sparse thin air

Beyond last light

To the treed moon

Fleeing from capture.

The blues

 Just cause you got the blues don’t mean you got to look blue.

What hast thou done?

 What hast thou done?

Johnclarestokes 

And I heard the voice 

of my brothers blood

crying from the ground.

And I heard the voice of

the trampling down.

And I heard the voice of

silence all around

And I heard the voice of

no patriot to be found.

And I heard the voice of

Olustee’s men of renown 

And they whispered,,

What hast thou done?

You’ll die

 You’ll die

Johnclarestokes 

When around the age of five

Nose picking was all the rage

Mamma tried everything to get

me to act my age

But nothing worked on the

little toe head.

Finally at her wits end

she took me to see Dr Head

the only doctor in Wakulla county 

To see if he could cure me.

He sat me down and in a serious tone

said, “you’ll die if you pick your nose.”

At first I feared, for I remembered Mrs Mary

lying in her bedroom, hands cross in the wake

and surely the Lord my soul I didn’t 

Want Him to take.

But then, my little high IQ kicked in

and I concluded this could not possibly be

maybe if I stared into the sun or peed into

the electric heater, but not from nose picking.

and so I left him satisfied I was cured.

And as far as mamma knew I was,

I made sure I only picked in secret 

Content on the banks of the Sopchoppy

Just me and a nose full of boogers 

and just a slight bit of conscience 

telling me, I sure hope Dr Head is

not proven to not be practicing quackery.

Guardian Mama

 Guardian mamma

John Clare Stokes 

She was lately into memory

things such as the beginning years

of hopscotch, books and butterflies

sharp and clear with mamma near 

all was well as long as she dreamed

but in the realm she found herself in

she had to shuffle down the hallway

three times daily painfully

to the strangers being served 

non homemade by mamma food

and even before she could open 

the unfamiliar door

her guardian mamma would gently say,

“now dear, aren’t we forgetting 

something?”

and she’d thank mamma and 

together they’d set out 

for the dining room.