At the Sparkle Laundromat on Rice Street
Greg Watson


The teenagers are bored, having nowhere else to go, not
wanting to go home to the drab familiarity of housing projects
and apartment complexes. We too are directionless, but
directionless in the same place and time—between jobs,
between loves, between ambitions; we are loitering without
intent. Hank Williams echoes from a small dusty speaker,
quarters tumble from the change machine, pool balls click with
soft indifference. The ceiling-high windows are veiled with
steam, impossible to tell at first glance if it is summer or winter,
daylight or evening. There is no stampede of years here, no
memory rushing in either direction, insistent on its own
inherent beauty—only the rhythm of machines in cycle, that
constant turning without arrival. We could come back decades
from now, pick up where we left off, wait it out for one more
song before returning to the world again.

Good morning!

Of course it depends on the time you are reading this. It is an early one for me. Lots to get done today.

Couple of new Doug Irwin songs in Barangie Hall.

Check 'em out.

The Bridges That I Burn

Where You Been

Great stuff.

Doctors 

Anne Sexton 

They work with herbs

and penicillin.

They work with gentleness

and the scalpel.

They dig out the cancer,

close an incision

and say a prayer

to the poverty of the skin.

They are not Gods

though they would like to be;

they are only human

trying to fix up a human.

Many humans die.

They die like the tender,

palpitating berries

in November.

But all along the doctors remember:

First do no harm.

They would kiss if it would heal.

It would not heal.

If the doctors cure

then the sun sees it.

If the doctors kill

then the earth hides it.

The doctors should fear arrogance

more than cardiac arrest.

If they are too proud,

and some are,

then they leave home on horseback

but God returns them on foot.

Yeah, it's corn pickin' time. Shouldn't pick until you have two frosts. Then it is prime time! 

Long story short.

Plan one. I had dump truck loads delivered and dumped in the open barn. Worked out fine except I had to fend off crows, turkeys, squirrels, raccoon and deer when I went to get some to feed the herd. Plus, the empty ear population was exploding. 

Plan two was picking up loads in my F-150 and then shoveling into the makeshift crib. Killed my back. 

Plan three was pulling a corn wagon from the field to the crib and using the bottom shoot to load the crib. Well friends, pulling a loaded corn wagon up and down winding rural switchback roads was a horrible experience! 8000 pounds of corn in nothing more than a dumpster with wheels is a white knuckle nightmare. Never again.

Plan four. Put a loaded corn wagon on a fifth wheel flatbed along with a generator and a electric loader. Back and knuckles seal of approval. 

Corn Picking 1956 - Afternoon Break
Tom Hennen


I needed a heavy canvas jacket riding the cold red tractor, air
an ice cube on bare skin. Blue sky over the aspen grove I drove
through on the way back to the field, throttle wide open, the
empty wagon I pulled hitting all the bumps on the dirt road. In
the high branches of the aspens little explosions now and then
sent leaves tumbling and spinning like coins tossed into the air.
The two-row, tractor-mounted corn-picker was waiting at the
end of the corn rows, the wagon behind it heaped so high with
ears of corn their yellow could be seen a mile away. My father,
who ran the picker, was already sitting on the ground, leaning
back against the big rear wheel of the tractor. In that spot out
of the wind we ate ham sandwiches and doughnuts, and drank
hot coffee from a clear Mason jar wrapped in newspaper to
keep it warm. The autumn day had spilled the color gold every-
where: aspen, cornstalks, ears of corn piled high, coffee mixed
with fresh cream, the fur of my dog, Boots, who was sharing
our food. And when my father and I spoke, joking with the
happy dog, we did not know it then, but even the words that
we carelessly dropped were left to shine forever on the bottom
of the clear, cold afternoon.

I am marking trees today to be cut and harvested for lumber. This song came Rushing through my head like a buzzing Stihl 450 chain saw. I have dozens of white and yellow pines that were topped by the severe ice storm a few years ago (killing then from the top down) and dozens of white and red oak that have reached full maturity and are dying from the bottom limbs up and getting hollow inside. I hate to do it but I feel it is better to use the resources than let them fall and rot away.



The Trees
Jarvis Branson Cocker, Alex Lifeson, Stephen Patrick Mackey, Candida Doyle, Joyce Kilmer, Geddy Lee, Mark Andrew Webber, Oscar Rasbach, Neil Peart, Nick Banks


There is unrest in the forest
There is trouble with the trees
For the maples want more sunlight
And the oaks ignore their pleas

The trouble with the maples
And they're quite convinced they're right
They say the oaks are just too lofty
And they grab up all the light
But the oaks can't help their feelings
If they like the way they're made
And they wonder why the maples
Can't be happy in their shade

There is trouble in the forest
And the creatures all have fled
As the maples scream 'Oppression!'
And the oaks just shake their heads

So the maples formed a union
And demanded equal rights
'The oaks are just too greedy
We will make them give us light'
Now there's no more oak oppression
For they passed a noble law
And the trees are all kept equal
By hatchet, axe and saw


Check it out-

https://youtu.be/JnC88xBPkkc

Veterans of the Seventies
Marvin Bell

His army jacket bore the white rectangle  
of one who has torn off his name.  He sat mute  
at the round table where the trip-wire veterans  
ate breakfast.  They were foxhole buddies  
who went stateside without leaving the war.  
They had the look of men who held their breath  
and now their tongues.  What is to say
beyond that said by the fathers who bent lower  
and lower as the war went on, spines curving  
toward the ground on which sons sat sandbagged  
with ammo belts enough to make fine lace  
of enemy flesh and blood.  Now these who survived,  
who got back in cargo planes emptied at the front,
lived hiddenly in the woods behind fence wires  
strung through tin cans.  Better an alarm  
than the constant nightmare of something moving  
on its belly to make your skin crawl  
with the sensory memory of foxhole living.

Smile
Walt Sample

Good morning my name is Mr. Sunshine
Good morning wake up and smile

Hand in hand let’s stroll along the cabernet vines
Checkin’ ‘em for ripeness laughin’ away our time
‘Cause tomorrow is a promise that one day won’t be kept
We gotta’ slow down smile cherish every breath

Good morning my name is Mr. Sunshine
Good morning wake up and smile

Why don’t we saddle up Sammy Joe and Ed
Ride ‘em all the way to old man Tucker’s shed
‘Cause tomorrow is a promise that one day won’t be kept
We gotta’ slow down smile cherish every breath

Good morning my name is Mr. Sunshine
Good morning wake up and smile

Eat a picnic lunch enjoy the brand new day
Listen to the robins sing hear what they have to say
‘Cause tomorrow is a promise that one day won’t be kept
We gotta’ slow down smile cherish every breath

Good morning my name is Mr. Sunshine
Good morning wake up and smile