Roscoe

 International Dog Day

Itchetucknee ai

 Which do you like? Ai not bad.

In dreams

 In dreams

John Clare Stokes

In dreams the blacks and whites

Of life take on swirling gusts

Of violet hues touched with

Glimmering golds...

In dreams the void and empty

Fills to overflowing in streams gurgling

Forth ultramarine and pure in a

Silvery sparkled flow...

In dreams the stark and sterile

Confines open to lush lands of

Verde grasses reaching

Infinite into secrets untold...

In dreams the parched and cracked

Ooze a rich raw umber as

Verona sprouts fill around our

Wiggled toes...

In dreams the lost and forgotten are

Led by a cadmium bright that

Winds high on cheer-thronged 

Avenues...

In dreams the dead and dying 

Are led from a caput mortuum deep

To a life forever painted anew

As awake in prismatic hues we dwell.

For Shirley Zecher and all the lovers of the colors of watery light

AI

 It just doesn’t know the people. So they don’t look as they did. But still…

Al

 Al can be good or terrible. I asked it to put me in the scene by the Sopchoppy swimming hole. It was great except the head looks nothing like me.

I asked it to place the lady Elsie Hall in front of the store. It was from a fuzzy photo of her, and since I didn’t know her, it looked good. It even changed the pumps to older versions. 

The silliest was my daddy and Laurice Robert’s and his dog who I asked to put in front of his station. Even though I had a photo it switched heights on daddy, making him taller than Mr Robert’s who towered over him. 

Days after

 Days after

Today is another one of those days after

When we’ve completed our reflecting

Faintly expecting the return of the son

This one the day after his thirtieth birthday

But why should we expect it

All the days once celebrated are now

Days after, weeks after, years after

We quit long ago counting

The days after

Lonely

In the morning expectation

awaiting the prodigal coming

You would settle in the interim 

For something to come along

A hummingbird 

A crow

A dragonfly 

A Cardinal

Anything

Lately there is such a dearth

Of something coming

It’s a lonely place.

Moon tipping two

 Mornings 

We’d take our red jet

And go out 

Moon tipping

Upset so

his setting

Moon tipping

 But those in the

Blue plane

We tried to explain

The art of

Moon tipping

They didn’t get it

And flew on past

Quite fast

I may add

Stoked life

 Stoked life 

I see my Stokes ones

and I only want to warn them

if they knew the stoked life

as I 

and the temptation 

and other such hurdles

confronting the

stoked life

they’d be well served

to stay in their 

Orander wear. 

First kill

 First Kill

Johnclarestokes 

I proudly shot daddy's Purple Martin that day

Not knowing they kept mosquitos at bay.

Mamma told me, Quickly! Go bury the bird!

And to your father not breath a word.

I dug a hasty grave behind the shed

Then hid the Red Rider under the bed.

Each evening I looked in fear as Martins flew

That somehow daddy counted and knew.

Such the guilt on a little boys brain

That a tiny bird could cause such strain.

Years passed, the Martin houses rotted and fell

Now I'm old, but bless mamma, she never did tell!

The first kill haunts us through our days

Till at last, Martins keep mosquitos at bay

Above our graves.

Mashes Sands

Wish we could always reign in

Mashes Sands

Johnclarestokes 

I do not know how the sand 

came from Mashes Sands 

to my sand pile in Sopchoppy

But my father got it there

And it was my kingdom  

My perimeter I only left

whenever I would swing

and jump past the pure sandy 

Border 

Flying about up into the evening

Til I heard mamma calling me in

And I would park the fleet

Open the sluice gates

Post the real plastic army men

With strictest orders

To guard the Mashes Sands

Kingdom in the county

Wakulla

The township

Sopchoppy

the state Florida

Ruled by the kindly

Tow head king,Jumpy.