So glad

 So sad, so sad, he missed the sun

So glad, so glad the rain has come.

For without the rain

The sun would fry his brain

Judging

Tonight is the awarded who excelled at the Library show. My thought is it will be the usual Herb Ellis show. The reason I am sure i won first last year was Herb didn’t enter. There are others too, equally adept. We shall know at 5:30.

 

Soft the fist

 Soft the fist

The Spirits such a kind, kind friend

He comes to us in our darkest mares

And for a spell tarry’s there

To listen to the tormentor telling

Do you not remember his hitting

How his words were so hurting

And you turn to deflect the blow

Frantic with no place left to go

Then the Spirit tells the tormentor 

Enough of your blows upon this soul

And breathes into the wounds healing

Deep, deeper while you are sleeping

And in the morning waking anew

A faint whisper comes to oppress

But somehow in the night to you

The terrible fist was turned to caress.

The night caller

 Night Caller

In the early hours of the deepest slumber

The little boy was wakened with a whisper

Calling him to come and join their number

It was a whisper once so familiar 

But the little boy was fearful to obey

And told no one of this whispering friend

Lest they chide him as when in vision

He once said he saw angels visiting 

The following evening at the same hour

Came the whispering one only much urgent

We haven’t time to tarry! For you I’m sent

Rise and we shall find the lost moments.

And so the boy arose and he did gladly go

With the night caller all was relived again

There was time with never a moment parting

He knew deeply all the passing scenes

The morning sun awoke him after many years

Was it a life upon lives lived so brief

Whatever it was the whispering one said

Eternity he was certain was but a continuation.

The slough way

 The slough way

John Clare Stokes

There is a place near the slow flowing upper Suwannee

Where the sand is white beneath palmetto thick, where

the track of the turkey and deer converge

beneath the shade of the grand, cool mystic 

In the impassible murky beyond the winding creek

The sound of rustling coming in the boggy way

It’s the piney wood rooters passing through

We scurry for a way of safety from the tusky

Up the lazy old oak into the abandoned stand

A pileated is startled to see the form of man

In time the beaded red eyed troop move on

All quiet resumes to consume the slough below

We saunter down not in a particular hurry

Wary lest the moccasin stirred from slumber

Strikes to count us among his number

Sure to follow close the well tracked trail out

Leaving this slough of the denizens of Suwannee

Past the sleeping foot washed ones of Prospect

There was no place upon earth we’d rather be

Than lost in the canopy of the primitive tree.

At Granny’s

 At Granny's

John Clare Stokes

Pappa she kept tightly in the urn upon the mantle place 

Great Granny's wooden leg propped open the bedroom breezeway

Nights I'd try and get to sleep quickly

Before granny came shuffling in with cold cream on her face

Through the cracks and chinks the wind whispered

Who is that lying in the feathered bed

Do we hold a wake for another now dead

Now it's just the wind I was assured.

Then from the Florida room a fiddle 

Upon the cool hard pine floor a tapping

Someone in there an old rhythm keeping

I dared not wake to peek in.

By morning rooster waking I asked

Granny did you enjoy last nights company

She smiled and dipped some Tube Rose slowly

Went about the early days tasks humming

Seems we weren't in this place by ourselves

I eventually grew accustomed to pappa Urn on the shelf

Great granny letting in the cool wind to warm by the hearth

Never invited but I eventually looked 

Forward to the midnight fiddling to begin.

Bug

 Bug

This is bug

His pedigree

Is he came

From Victor

The brother

In jail now

Who bought

Him for Ebony

His little 

Princess

Who I

Purchased

For twenty

For my little

Prince

He was afraid

Of Bug

Who would

Whinney and

Snort

Must of been

His raising

Cross the tracks

For even without

His 4 batteries

In the dead

Of night 

Bug would neigh 

In the living room

Waking me

And I would 

Go in and rub

Him down and

Give him some

Straw

I think even 

Though the

Prince feared him

And the Princess

Outgrew him

He still called

For them.

Mighty tired Coach

 Mighty tired coach Honea

With the loss

With the loss

With the loss

When was the

Winning season

Winning season

Never made state

Never will

Never will

The third place yellow district ribbon fades 

Jon Perry of PK Young

Forever winning

Winning 

Winning 

The 180 low 

hurdle race

20.2

Golden years

 Golden Years

johnclarestokes 

The father recalls the golden years

Of a son that once lingered near

Of a father matching his gait

Pausing often to wait

Keeping the son in sight

And they would stop and listen

Poised in aim at any rustling 

Hid in the tree boughs watching

And the crows would alarm at the sound

On the father and son looking down

The father would whisper now son

And the son would squeeze the trigger on the gun

And the father would say well done

Beaming with the bagging of the bushy tail

Of golden years the story we often would tell.

Lil daredevil

 Lil daredevil 

Days we somehow much more miss

Others it’s as if it never did exist

But the short time we had

Was grand for this grand mom and dad.

Days of malaise

 It's got to be the days of malaise 

We just want to sit and dwell upon

The cool, fall days

But we must rise to face the heat

Lilies languishing at our feet.

Good while it lasted

 Good while it lasted

My cousins in Mississippi and Alabama, Jeanne and Sue, took it upon themselves to plan a family reunion for this weekend in Homewood, Mississippi, their mother and father and my fathers birthplace. Lots of work went into it and hopes were high. Then one by one, circumstances arose and this one wasn’t coming, that one was sick, another just never responded. And so the reunion was cancelled, then revived with a remnant, then even that was cancelled today.

They said they wouldn’t plan another. It’s sad to live to witness the death of a family. Many I never knew except maybe a week or so my entire life when thankfully, our parents still took vacations to visit family, but no longer. We shall always remain strangers. Thank you Jeanne and Sue for trying.