Never too low to look up
Never too high to see down
Let the brother of low degree rejoice in that he is exhaulted.
Sunday, July 20, 2025
Keep on the sunny side
In the beginning
It’s really no mystery, for since as long as there has been light, we have had means to capture it properly. Sunny sixteen is the same sunny sixteen it was in 1870 as it is in 2020. It worked then, it works now. Find an old film box and cut the exposure guide out and carry it with you. Then in your moment of doubt, it will rescue you.
The picket line
On the Pickett line
Cardinals I find rarely posing
They are impatient with publicity
Don't like being in the open
Rather hide in thick trees
Like me...
Jude cloud
Thus cumulus prayed, I do not want to be a cloud without water, carried about of the wind
Ada and Elsie
Ada and Elsie
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.
Wagon days
Wagon Days
Johnclarestokes
In its day it was a sedan...a convertible...a van...a pick up.... all rolled into one...Harness the Ox and it was a mud bogger....Harness the horse and it was a stock car...Harness the stubborn mule and with your gal beside you...A convenient explanation why you stayed out so late....
Maude Grays wagon in the barn now gone
How neatly
How neatly
The poetry
Poetry
Is best left beside you
Not neatly arranged
On the shelf
Out of easy reach
Scattered and askance
For when the call
From Emily with Wallace
Comes
One does not want
To hastily arise
And untidy
The home.
A gift meant for another
Lies within the clutch
Awaiting the delivery
One must not covet
Or even in your haste
Of life
Forget the languishing
Gift
As another
For whom it’s meant
Perhaps teeters upon
The edge of
Tottering.
Beautiful
Just tell me
Everything beautiful
Beautiful dream
You’re beautiful
Oh beautiful for spacious skies
Everything is beautiful
In its own way
Think on these things
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