Papa
Jack was always a joker,
using the animals
for some prank or scheme,
but Lewis loved them
deep and hard.
They were a team:
Lewis,
his Bonnie dog,
and Queenie --
the old mare
who was so patient,
so gentle with Lizzy and Henry.
Lewis has been gone nearly a year,
but whenever a car comes into the yard
they both look up hopefully.
©Mary Lee Hahn, 2016
That last stanza! Wow! Stabs this dog/horse lover right in the gut!
ReplyDeleteI also love the line, "Lewis loved them DEEP AND HARD." Perfect combination of words.
DeleteAnother day of morning writing.
ReplyDelete"Meeting"
So Ma snapped this picture
out in the middle of the corral
I think it was my junior year
in high school,
but I might have been a senior
it's a nice picture
and I hung it over my desk
when I moved away
and missed all that
furry love
but this photo
out in public
with everyone watching
and shouting atus
to smile and say cheese
that's not how it really was
mostly, we three,
were a team
and we lived quiet
whenever life got too big
when Alice Brown dumped me
eleven days after she said
she couldn't wait to get married
when I didn't make first team basketball
(my brother always did)
when Pa told me that
being an artist wasn't a career
and I better figure out
a way to make a living
I'd go out and sit on the fence
or on a hay bale in the barn
just kinda quiet like
and pretty soon
that old brown mare
would come up and nuzzle my hand
she was always checking for an apple or a carrot
or her favorite, a lump of sugar that
I stole from ma's blue china bowl
and the dog-- I always fed her,
and so she decided
when she was just a pup
that she was mine--
she'd somehow squeeze her way
between the horse and me
leaning against my legs
and hoping for a good scratch
under the old leather collar
with the broken buckle
that we never quite
got around to replacing
and the three of us
would hold a private meeting
we'd confer
until we solved
the world's problems
and life was good again
(C) Carol Wilcox
"but this photo
Deleteout in public
with everyone watching
and shouting atus
to smile and say cheese
that's not how it really was"
The essence of this project, eh?
The two of you with these poems are choking me up. An animal lover...so much truth here. So much goodness. So much honesty. Love reading both. xxx
ReplyDelete