Journey with John Stokes

Thursday, January 8, 2026

Homewood

john clare

Father, what shall we call

The old Towles house

Shall we name it Gavin

For the slave who built

It of the heart pine

Shall we name it Camellia

For the wedding gift

Bushes by the steps

Shall we name it Lucille

For the blind matron

Whose cane etched her

Path down the dog trot

Shall we name it Ethel Marie

For a mother who died

Too soon in August

We shall name it for all

These things

We shall call it

Homewood.

Wednesday, January 7, 2026

To an atlete

Honeymoon Marathon

Melanie offering a cup of water on the January 9,1988 Jacksonville Marathon. We were married in Williston the previous evening.

To an athlete dying young

The time you won your town the race

We chaired you through the market-place;

Man and boy stood cheering by,

And home we brought you shoulder-high.

To-day, the road all runners come,

Shoulder-high we bring you home,

And set you at your threshold down,

Townsmen of a stiller town.

Smart lad, to slip betimes away

From fields where glory does not stay,

And early though the laurel grows

It withers quicker than the rose.

Eyes the shady night has shut

Cannot see the record cut,

And silence sounds no worse than cheers

After earth has stopped the ears.

Now you will not swell the rout

Of lads that wore their honours out,

Runners whom renoun outran

And the name died before the man.

So set, before its echoes fade,

The fleet foot on the sill of shade,

And hold to the low lintel up

The still-defended challenge-cup.

And round that early-laurelled head

Will flock to gaze the strengthless dead,

And find unwithered on its curls

The garland briefer than a girl's.

A.E.Housman

C.March 1895,1896

Kid gloves

What came of the kid gloves

treating one another

with care

Much love to spare

Never a shove

Oh the bare knuckle

Blows upon jaws

As kid gloves fall

Love crumples.

Last evening...the blowing wind...decided who would live...and who would die...Last evening...I determined....who would live...and who would die... placing blankets over some....leaving others to succumb...Last evening...the blowing wind...blew the blankets....blew them over the plants...I sentenced to die....killing the plants....l deemed to live...Last evening.

Good times

Early days of 87 when Mel and I were dating. The only time she met Uncle Curtis and Aunt Grace from Syrma,Ga at Crawfordville. We later named Jordon for Curtis. With sister Paula, dog Beasley, Allison and Jessica, Luther and Clara.

For Melanie

In the beginning of our journey

We went flower picking in Micanopy

Later, from Lucille Towles camellia

Her wedding gift many years earlier

I presented Melanie many

So every time I see a Camellia

I think of Melanie

056

7jan17

Camellia

For promotion

For promotion cometh neither from the east, nor from the west, nor from the south. But God is the judge: He putteth down one, and setteth up another. Psalms 75:6-7.