We are the fleshy pit of a wooden fruit that remains lodged
inside the esophagus of a nameless office building,
too historic for corporate enzymes to break down,
too fibrous for second grade impatients to digest.

Pass me your torch—I’m getting blackened today.

Remember when we took our undressed crayons
and grazed them across white paper
over the embossed plaque outside
and the story of this place
spelled out before our very eyes?
And our very eyes, how they widened.
Yes, you do.
Yours was red, and mine was blue.

Remember when you spelled SALSA wrong at the spelling bee,
and the whole cafetorium began to hiss and judge
as the judge bellowed the L-est L ever to be L-ed,
and your ankles were too rusted from embarrassment to get away,
and away you went,
and I called you Mr. Sasla for weeks?
Of course you do.
You were ten, and I was, too.

How after that we ran away like bandits to this place on South Main,
and we picked and we plucked at the locks,
and scratched away at the ashy continents on the walls,
etching oaken paintings of our names married to profanities
even though we didn’t know the meanings
that made them so profane?
I know you do.
You wrote ****—I wrote *******.

And that time when you tried to kiss me
in the corner by the condemned yellow jacket nests
that sagged like hard candy on the splintered walls,
but your empty lips tumbled into the tentacles of a cobweb,
and the moment snuck away
with the stagnant smell of mesquite and adolescence?
Ha! Look at you!
You were laughing—I was, too.

And remember when you got your braces off
and I just about cried because I hadn’t seen your teeth
in days—in weeks?—in months?—in years?—
and through the snaggled gate of your cuspid
and incisor that no amount of metal would ever fix,
the medicated steam slipped, and spilled like milk?
That was last June.
We sat right here, where were you?

And that night when the fugue of sirens tugged at our ears
and we frantically clogged the seams
where the light seeped through with our socks
and our shirts, try try trying to keep the haze from sneaking out—
only to find it wasn’t us they were after, it was the
bank robber next door—and we swore to never come here again?
Our faces changed, too.
Yours was red, and mine was blue.

Yet, our torch melts to ash, and we become blazed as one.

We are here, reclined against rusty limestone as smoke
forms above our skulls like question marks, as red rivers
meander closer to our pupils, as the taste of our memory becomes
too salty to swallow, yet too sweet not to taste just one more time.

I squint  just right
And capture a memory almost forgotten
Jars of fruit and honey fresh from hives
Filling shelves in old smokehouse
Home-made butter and molasses
In her kitchen
Waiting to smother
Biscuits warming
On black cast iron wood-stove
Boxes of buttons
An old cameo
Split wood in corner
Old sleepy dog on porch
The house on the hill
Where Mom's Granny rocked

r ~ 16Feb14

At eight weeks old, she was our newly rescued mixed beagle pup.

Noah named her Daisy. Not a name I would have chosen, but certainly as sweet as

memories of Grandma's homemade molasses
bubbling in the old iron kettle brought out from the smokehouse for only one day each year on a crisp fall morning.

By sixteen weeks it was evident that all involved in the rescue didn't know squat about Beagles. After a frantic thirty seconds on Google, our mistake was quite clear in the form of about five hundred red and black and tan photographs.   We were the proud but red-faced and slightly shocked owners of a "**** Dog". Yep. And Daisy was her name-o.

Two years and seventy pounds down the road, I sat in my morning solitude spot this day with a good mug and a good book watching the nut hatches, house finch, and Black-capped/Carolina Chickadees tearing that special blend seed up as Daisy patrolled the yard for squirrels with one eye and her nose to the sky watching for the lone and clever Rock Pigeon scout that always precedes the flurry of flying rodents raiding my feeder. I can't help but to smile as Daisy glances at me through the deck door glass to see if I am admiring her skill and diligence.   I am.

This being a Sunday before the dreaded M word day, I tend to lounge lazily around the house in my worn Clapton pj bottoms and hol(e)y Langley T-shirt. My shadow follows me from comfort to comfort spot knowing that I leave a trail of odd snacks from my kitchen perch to living room couch to study to lazy bed, and back again. She is showing a bit of winter fat.

To be continued....

r ~ 9Feb14

a voice thick and grizzled
soaked in a deep bourbon for countless years
taken out to be dried in a once burnt smokehouse
then shot twice with rock salt and hit by a '56 Chevy
a voice to be raised too

I grew up like you

              with you

         taller than you

             a country girl

                     through and through like you

long summer days

        a golden haze

                     of corn

                     and wheat

                      and barley

frozen winter nights

                   instilling us with fright

                            when we'd hear the coyotes howl

                             and spend the next day

                            wondering what they had done

playing outside

           in the mud

          in the sun

           in the fields

            in the smokehouse

           on the roads

there were no cars

              no people

               no noises

       to distract us from our fun

now we're older

     adults I suppose

     I'm still a country girl

But you're an everywhere girl

        I'm too afraid

        to pick up and leave

        my roots tie me down

         and I can't escape

       this life I have not even tried to make

But you

            you're an everywhere girl

                   at home

                        cities

                         towns

                          near and far

                          across the world

                                 alone in concrete glass and steel

                 you are happy

                  you are alive

                   you are filled with wonder

                   so bursting with emotion

                                          that you forget to call me

your sister

                     alike

                         but unlike you

          who doesn't need to hear your voice every day

          your friend in silence

                     your friend in conversation

           who understands your need to adventure

                        who wishes for her own stories

but is too scared to move

                 go too far

                          from what she knows

I wish that I was an everywhere girl too

                         loving it all

                      free rambling

                   independent

                          always smiling

                       You're a record store

                                   full of music

           You're a Wonka bar

                         hiding a golden ticket

                    You're a bonfire

                                       keeping everyone warm

                                 shooting sparks into the night

      Looking for nothing

            but finding EVERYTHING

You're an everywhere girl

                  and I'm learning a lot from you

You're an everywhere girl

            and I want to be too

A generous amount of ferocious wind , a ladle of roaring thunder and a cup or two of 'nerve racking hail ..'
A handful of blue lightning with a pressure cooker full of rain ,
an armful of 'nasty charcoal nimbus' and 'puppy dog- puffy cumulus' stirred into a heaping bowl of 'humid Georgia sunshine ..'
Turn the Old rooster weathervane to the East , hurry up and gather the last pile of leaves ..
Get the turkey chicks in the barn , shut down the smokehouse ..
Tie the scarecrow off , call the family together and head for the storm cellar !

the snow built up around the smokehouse.
the sun shone on the snow.
and the sun's rays were blistering against my eyes.
the long night was well on its way
so i made good use of what was left of the daylight
walking out toward the main street
and coming back home again.
sleeping, i sang a short song about you.
and i knew every word of that song was true.
well, almost every word.

ice froze the green stems of the daffodils
ice formed carrots on my window sill.
i was blistering, blazing away.
and it had always been my tendency to let things slide,
but i went to the window with my eyes open wide.
and you were taking on prospect ice,
coming to ward the door.
you want some more?
i've got some more for you.
i've got just what you're looking for.

Cry o'er this sadness
Refreshing red clay in the guise of granite
With pools of wrigglers , black tadpoles ,
water striders , afternoon of titmouse , bluebird and robin
Of lacewings and locust culled neath
the bounty of spring , lantern fly , mantid ,
field gnats riding turbulent April waves
O'er tin shack , pole barn and smokehouse
Barbecue pit , wood shed and well house
Hour of depression abated , of fragrant treasure
ablated* ...

On my grandparents farm I recall
laying in the grass on the quilt that grandma made
looking up through the breezy tree's to the blue skies and bright sun
Summer half over, getting close to harvest time
The grandparents are walking through their fields of vegetables to be harvested
Uncle sitting on the tractor under a shady tree sipping at some tea
My aunt  sitting on the porch swing drinking some pop, resting after cleaning out the Smokehouse.
Gathering and cleaning ball and mason jars for harvest
It's been a busy summer of growing the fall harvest.
The cows standing outside the fence looking at me as if I'm going to entertain them.
We are preparing for family to arrive to construct the bountiful harvest for the following spring.
I see one car turn in, then another and another, then a line of five cars turn, and drive up the long lane.

The snow built up around the smokehouse
And the sun shone on the snow
And the sun's rays were blistering against my eyes
The long night was well on its way
So I made good use of what was left of the daylight
Walking out toward the main street
And coming back home again
Sleeping, I sang a short song about you
And I knew every word of that song was true
Well, almost every word

Ice froze the green stems of the daffodils
Ice formed carrots on my window sill
I was blistering, blazing away
And it had always been my tendency to let things slide
But I went to the window with my eyes open wide
And you were taking on perspective
Coming toward the door
You want some more
I've got some more for you
I've got just what you're looking for

Lawrence Hall, HSG
[email protected]


                                           ­  Cigarettes and Despair


You’ve been to junior high; you know the drill
When childhood fragments into hormones and emotions
And nobody told you it was coming
The fear, the wild uncertainty, the loss

You’re expected at funerals and weddings
(Shhhhhhhhh! They do what!? I don’t believe it! Why!?)
You’re too old to play with toys anymore
Too young for Jack Daniels and midnight rides

You steal a couple of Daddy’s cigarettes
And smoke behind the smokehouse, in despair

I walk these woods
Wild azaleas, ladies slippers and sweet shrub
Bobcats, deer, turkey and bear
Towering pines and hardwoods
A cushion of straw and leaves
Knee-deep in some places.

I remember rabbit hunting here as a child.
Back then, there were still open spaces
Filled with broom sedge, honeysuckle and bare red clay.
Blackberry briars and pine trees no taller than my head
Red Cedars and hollies everywhere for Christmas
We always came and cut our tree here.

It seems an untouched wilderness now
But if you go slow and look closely
You can still see faint reminders of my people

Flat stones stacked three high
The pillars for a barn or house long gone
A stone chimney half fallen
Because bees have stolen the mud chinking.

The outline of the springhouse
Where they kept the milk cool
The hole where later, when they could afford the time
They dug a well by hand.


Rusty barbed wire growing out of the center of huge trees
A reminder of better times
When there was money to buy wire
And enough neighbors that the cattle no longer roamed free

A whisky still by the creek
Dug down into a hole to hide it
The still full of axe holes
Cut by the revenuers
When they finally found it

Irish whisky to grease the fiddle
At the barn dance
To make the feet fly in a merry jig
And to drown the sorrows  
There were plenty of those

The farm next door
Where the husband went out to the barn one day
And hanged himself.

Ditches deeper than a man is tall
Zigzag across the landscape like lightning strikes
Reminders of what they learned
That the rains would wash the top soil down into the creek
Leaving nothing to nourish the crops.

In the end, the government offered assistance
Men with book learning called County Agents
Men who knew how to survey elevations
And design terraces that still curve through the deep woods

It was too little too late
But farming was all they knew
So the farmers spent weeks and months and years
Digging and damming to build
Those little pyramids of salvation
To save their soils

They were poor as the dirt itself.
And now, even the dirt was gone

It was no way to live
Finally they began abandoning the farms.
Slowly at first, then an avalanche
They went to the towns and cities
Assembly line workers
Who didn't mind 12 hour days
Or amputations.

The farms stood there
Little ghost towns on every 50 acres.
Snakes and mice moved into the houses.
The buildings burned or rotted
The storehouse, the smokehouse, the barn, the chicken coop.

These are my people
I walk where they walked
I see what was lost
I cherish what remains

I remember watching some hogs grow nice and round.
And listening to their funny grunting sounds.
I even gave them names.
And felt like they were my pets playing games.
I was surprised and felt so sad and unstable.
When the funny hogs ended up in the smokehouse and on the dinner table.