Spring tangles shadow and light,
Branches of trees
Knit vision and wind.
The shape of the wind is a tree
Bending, spilling it’s birds.
From the cloud to the stone
The rain stands tall,
Columned into his darkness.
The church hill heals our father in.
Our remembering moves from a different place.
Eulogy
Wendell Berry
Hoyle F Crowder Sr
1947
July 10, 2018
Johnclarestokes
The day was drawing to a frenetic close
the miles of repeated pines to never end,
low on fuel, how far must this forest go?
when up ahead, a single bulb flickering.
Turning into the lone, little gas station store,
the elderly lady rose from her rocking chair,
“we don’t see many travelers in Needmore,
mostly they are rushing past going elsewhere.”
While the gallons rang, she told of her life,
tales of bee gums sweet upon Deep Creeks,
of her long departed husband courting her,
the marriage at Oak Grove, the kiss on the cheek.
She could have left this forgotten little stop
and moved down to Lake Cities grandeur,
but she and Elsie chose to remain by the blacktop
telling her stories to the passers in obscurity.
Slowly lowering the handle of the Supreme,
as the mysterious lady settled into her rock,
a desperate longing to linger in this remote dream
where the weary heading elsewhere seldom stop.
Later that night, they had to stop at another station
the needle on the gauge read below low,
“Why didn’t we just fill up back in Needmore?”
“Needmore?” the attendant said, “Why Mrs Ada
and Elsie closed that station over twenty years ago.”
To the memory of John Raleigh and Ada Alford Hall and their daughter Vera Elsie Hall who took over after them.
Johnclarestokes
this was written in 2011 on the eve of the Space Shuttles final voyage and on the now 52nd anniversary of landing upon the moon.
Soon Atlantis sounds her final sonic boom
as dark side of the moon landings revert
to a memory of history,
our dreams crashing upon the globe of gloom,
dimming vision down to an earth bound misery.
Will they have perished in vain?
The Flash Gordon’s who pierced the stratosphere,
the latter-day Elijah’s who in their fiery chariots came,
to give the huddled masses something to cheer.
To drink from the fountains of a Milky Way,
fathom first hand the cradle of the celestial dawn,
embrace if but for a moment creations day,
compose from the Martian Sea a new song.
Far beyond the life of today’s narrow men,
a Galileo shall rise and point to the skies,
to heavenly Atlantis we must sail again!
As a gleam returns to the shrouded eyes.
John Clare Stokes
Each time happening upon a steel conversation chair
I pause to listen as those who long passed speak
Where words last left off seems merely a week
Catching again these conversations from the chair.
It’s in the old steel the conversation comes
Mysteriously transmitted from the living past
Memories transforming to spoken words passed
The moments spent with them most comforting
Tell me again red conversation chair
The love we knew so strong for so long
Where tell me have your words gone
Lift breeze to steel tell me you’re near.
Not sure what the red shouldered clutched in the pine needles as I barely had time to shoot as he flew off the wire.
Now, if only I could shoot like the Wolfe!
from which the water flowed
another we knew smitten
from which blood flowed
Tired of the same ole Star Fleet coffee and doughnuts? Tired of Federation theology? We invite you to attend Klingon Hall.
We embrace your prideful ruthlessness and brutality.
Where phasers are set to fun.
By John Clare
My greatest desire above all
To abide as one upon the vine
Bringing forth fruit in time
Then resting come the fall.
No need to depend upon me
But simply let the vine
Flow the sap into mine
All from Him, simply freely.
And after the harvest ends
The Master wields his knife
To end my dead life
So new growth can begin
In the vineyard across the road
The shoots are never pruned
They multiply until all too soon
The vine breaks under the load
The fruit spoils upon the ground
No wine at the wedding flows
They bundle up the dead boughs
Up to the heavens flames abound
Meant to grow in the light
The vines made a grand shade
The husbandman abandoning the blade
Stealing off under cover of night
But in the vineyard of the King
The clusters grew in the sun
Upon new vines upon the one
As to the bride the finest wine did come.
My dad and I for years grew muscadine grapes. I dearly miss them and the lessons learned from them.
Rudy Medlock
I rate Rudy as my all time favorite art professor at Asbury. A potter, he taught color theory, but it was his humble, wise, inspired way that won me over. This is his home outside Wilmore I'd love to spend time in again.
Rudy died in his studio earlier this year.
John Clare stokes
As a crow flew
it was a straight shot
to you
bypassing Orange Hill
the chills
going around the grotto
the chills
the moon would rise
i would howl
don't know why
seemed the thing
to do.
But I was grounded
it was a long way
to you
going right through
the cemetery
the chills
swimming through the grotto
the chills
the moon would rise
i would howl
now i know why
still seems the thing
to do.
Blind John sometimes felt being on the dark side was asking a bit too much.
In looking back on the comments of this depiction, it was totally frustrating that no one got it, or said inane things.
The dark side is a Nikon photographer. Unlike Canon, whose longer lenses are white. Same with Sony. Nikons are black. Lighten up Judy and all you literalists.
