Swallowtail serenade

 The Swallowtail serenade 

Palestine Lake

Long distant fall

 Long distant fall

Johnclarestokes 

Yesterday I heard the sirens heading your way

Later I learned you had fallen and couldn’t get up

And I was saddened by my long ago prophecy 

That this fall began when we broke up

It wasn’t so much that being mine was grand

That immunity from distant falling was granted 

It was best we never made a home stand

That the Passion flowers were never planted 

We went our separate ways and faded in memory

Occasionally I would ask whatever came of you

Someone would vaguely say she seems happy

I’d nod and think of sirens flashing red and blue

Can rehabs mend the lovers lives long fallen

Prophecy fulfilled can be such a cruel thing

In the night I’m awakened by your frantic calling

I lay there and count the haunted rings.

Sharp memory

 Sharp memory

Johnclarestokes 

The days have come where I am thankful

for some of my most memorable times

the camera was along to preserve the day

the very place where we’d sit and would

barely say any words, deep in thought

of those things growing, those lives going

those things coming to break the silence.

For now I’ve come to live long enough

that these things are gone from there

I’d be hard pressed to stand upon the

spot we once sat in the afternoon sun

the gardening done, the supper simmering

the tinge of fall in the air, the hum of a

hymn upon the wind, the silence listening.

Father and Son on a Sunday morning

Crawfordville 

Kodachrome

1980’s

Breath of lives

 Breath of lives

John Clare Stokes

They say the Suwannee is a living entity

That if you stand silent and listen

You can hear the respirations 

Faint as a wisp at times

Breathless gasping loud at others 

When I stand in the places others stood

I sense the river continues their breathing

Keeping the memory of their lives alive

And I exhale slowly and the river

Takes my breath.

Judy Hancock by Suwannee

Crossing Him

 Crossing Him

John Clare Stokes

There is never a rhyme or reason

Adequate to explain His coming 

He comes at the opportune 

He comes at the inopportune 

When least expected

When most expected

Today He beckoned above

The First Baptist steeple

Just as the insurance man 

Was lured at the same time

Midnight smokers

 Midnight smokers

John Clare Stokes

The men of my beginning days

were the best smokers I ever knew

with his end of day shot and smokes

East River Mountain behind us 

I’d open my candy pack and we’d chill

selling Mustangs for Andy Clark

was hard work for Uncle Kermit

but Bluefield was cool

and soon we’d spread some

of Geneva’s apple butter

Up in sweltering Smyrna, Georgia

I’d pull up near the recliner chair

to pack the pipe and wait anxiously 

for the sweet tobacco to ignite

see the smoke permeate the room

with the Braves on radio and Aunt Grace whistling

some Hurt Road Baptist hymn

Tell me again Uncle Curtis the story

How do you ask a girl if she likes chicken?

To hold out my arm and say,

Well take a wing?

. 

Down in ole Sopchoppy Mr Emory Rudd

On the porch steps each morning 

His match boxes and Prince Albert tins

Gifts waiting for a little tow head boy to play with

As back in the kitchen Mrs Mary stirred

over some bread pudding for the two

one packing a pipe and the other pretending too.

Aleph

 Aleph

John Clare Stokes

I do not know if Aleph still abides

as once He did long ago

He was present in the shadow

Present in the light

You could sense His moving 

It moved you, even if only subtle 

The shadow on the pew forms the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet on the long gone Mt Tabor Methodist.

word became cherished

 And the Word became cherished

And was read among us.

Even dwelt inside some of us

And we beheld it wondrously 

As e’en from the Father o’er us. 

Falling Creek Chapel

Flames of Tabor

 The flames of Tabor

Beneath a freezing Luna moth moon

The Arsonist was darkly drawn

Drawn yearning anything burning 

The old left side wooden door opening 

Strewn on worn hand hewn planks

Hymn pages beneath empty pews

Blest be he ties and binds the kindling

For flames of darkness thanking

In Tabor today no Holy flame dwells

Just a deep, deep dried up well

Beneath the Live Oaks on Sundays gathering

The Methodist mice and moth lost Congregation.

Anniversary

 Anniversary

Johnclarestokes 

Was this the day

that Friday the fifth

In the Santa Fe you did wade

Vows made

That day shade

Deadly

We just couldn't see it

Murky at the time

The spell of cool water

Beneath our bare feet

Keeping such future 

Thoughts at bay

Upon that place

The trees continue 

To fall

Those rocks thought 

So hard

Were but clay

Breaking easily

It's not a spot to say vows

Above in the broken limbs

The wind howls

The Owls they flee

Upstream possibly

It goes underground

Should of known it then.

It was on a Friday the 5th in 2010 we stood in the Santa Fe, the same spot the little baby boy took his first boat ride. It too, was eventful, for the sheer pin on the kicker broke. Downstream and too swift to paddle back, I pulled mamma and baby back with the bowline.

The earth crieth

 The earth crieth 

It soaks in the rain

With the blood

That pooled where

Brothers fought

It's what the 

Thorns and briars

Need to thrive

The bitter gall

Of a long ago fall

That seems so

Quaint

By today's

Gore 

How serpents 

Could entice

And how fruit

Would suffice

Howling in our

Skins

Still the same

Redeemer 

Who walked then

In the evening

Would send the

Rain

To cleanse the

Blood from your

Stone

Quiet your howling

In the garden

You roam.

Ankle white

Ankle White 

Johnclarestokes 

The white acre peas shelled....  The love apple vines staked....She finished her canning....Hung the pan and set out...and what of this quiet lady...what were her dreams....what were the heart aches...what called beyond the garden gate...

If ever she had dreams..she never let it be known.. the golden thread in the dress gleamed...long after she had gone...with the slow pull trembling...the ornate thimble upon her thumb...little practical  pleasures allowed….the lowering of the hem...the humming of the hymn…the virgin white flesh never showing....white ankles out there somewhere sunning.